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Xerxes, Frontispiece 

The Capture of the Acropolis by the Persians. ( Seep. 306. ) 



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ALTE/nUS' YOUNG PEOPLE'S LIBRARY 



niSTORY 



or 



XERXES THE GREAT 




43744 

]-)br«iry of Cona»*«9* 
■*VrU CUP4CS l^iCEti^EO 

SEP 5 1900 

C«f ynght tntry 

SECOND COPY. 

Oedvsrod to 

0«0£R OWJSION, 

SEP 7 1900 






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CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER I. p^GE 

The Mother of Xerxes .... 7 

CHAPTER II. 
Egypt and Greece 25 

CHAPTER III. 
Debate on the Proposed Invasion of 

Greece 44 

CHAPTER IV. 
Preparations for the Invasion of Greece 6-4 

CHAPTER y. 

The Crossing of the Hellespont . . 84 

CHAPTER VI. 
The Review of the Army at Doriscus . 103 

CHAPTER VIT. 
Preparations of the Greeks for De- 
fense 127 

CHAPTER VIII. 
The Advance of Xerxes into Greece . 150 

CHAPTER IX. 
The Battle of Thermopylae . . . 171 

CHAPTER X. 
The Burning of Athens .... 192 

CHAPTER XI. 
The Battle of Salamis .... 209 

CHAPTER XII. 
The Return to Persia .... 245 

(v) 



ILLUSTRATIONS. 



Capture of the Acropolis by tlie Persians, Frontispiece. 
The Pyramids of Egypt 
Tailpiece ..... 
The Interior of the l^irtheiion 
Headpiece, Chapter I. . 
View of Corinth .... 
The Sphinx .... 

Headpiece, Chapter II. 
View of the Delta of the Nile 
Rebuilding a City of Judea . 
Headpiece, Chapter III. 
A View on the Nile 
Ancient Athens .... 
Headpiece, Chapter IV. 
Map of the Persian Empire 
Trophies ..... 
Headpiece, Chapter A^. 
Map of the Grecian Enipire 
The Persian iVrmy Crossing the Hellespont 
Headpiece, Chapter VI. 
Combat Between Persians and Greeks . 
Headpiece, Chapter VII. 
A View of Ancient Sparta . . facing " 128 

Ceremony of Presenting Earth and Water " " 134 

'• " 144 



facing " 



facing " 



facing " 



facing 



facinj 



page VI 
. '' viii 
. " X 
. " 7 
20 
24 
25 
32 
43 
44 
48 
63 
64 
70 
83 
84 
84 
100 
103 
126 
127 



The Vale of Tempe 



(vii) 



Vlll 



ILLUSTRATIONS. 



Departure of the Grecian Fleet for Tliessaly, page 149 



Headpiece, Chapter VII T. 


. 


' 150 


Disaster to the Persian Fleet 


facing ' 


' 168 


Headpiece, Chapter IX. 




' 171 


The Battle of Thermopylae . 


facing ' 


' 186 


Headpiece, Chapter X. 


. 


' 192 


Departure of the Grecian Fleet 


facing ' 


' 192 


Headpiece, Chapter XL 


. 


' 209 


The Battle of Salamis . 


facing ' 


' 236 


Xenophon 


• ' 


' 244 


Headpiece, Chapter XII. 


. -' 


' 245 


The Palace of Xerxes . 


fiicing ' 


' 258 


Tailpiece 


. ' 


' 260 




INTRODUCTORY. 



One of the first acts of Xerxes after succeed- 
ing his father, Darius I., on the throne of Per- 
sia, was to subdue the rebellious Egyptians, 
who Avere in active revolt at the time of his 
accession. Then from all parts of his empire 
he assembled a vast army, and, with the addi- 
tion of an enormous fleet, furnished by his 
Phoenician allies, started upon the third Per- 
sian attempt to subjugate Greece. 

All went well until the invaders reached the 
narrow defile of Thermopylae. Here Leonidas 
and his three hundred Spartans held them at 
bay until slaughtered to a man. Then the 
Persian horde swept on to Athens, but, finding 
it deserted, destroyed and pillaged temple and 
house alike. 

The rival fleets met in the strait between 
Salamis and Attica, and the struggle was in 
favor of liberty and patriotism. Seated on a 
throne upon the shore, Xerxes saw the total 
rout of his fleet, and fled with his troops from 
the scene of the disaster. His hopes of con- 
quest died with the fall of his general, Mar- 
donius, on the field of Platsea, and he returned 
to his empire, where he was murdered by 
Artabanus. 

(ix) 




Xerxf'', X 



Interior of the Parthenon. {^See p. 201. ) 




XERXES. 



CHAPTER I. 



THE MOTHER OF XERXES. 



The name of Xerxes is associated in the 
minds of men with the idea of the highest at- 
tainable elevation of human magnificence and 
grandeur. This monarch was the sovereign of 
the ancient Persian empire when it was at the 
height of its prosperity and power. It is prob- 
able, however, that his greatness and fame lose 
nothing by the manner in which his story comes 
down to us through the Greek historians. The 
Greeks conquered Xerxes, and, in relating his 
history, they magnify the wealth, the power, 
and the resources of his empire, by way of ex- 
alting the greatness and renown of their own 
exploits in subduing him. 

The mother of Xerxes was Atossa, a daugh- 
ter of Cyrus the Great, who was the founder 
of the Persian empire. Cyrus was killed in 



8 XEllXES. 

Scytliia, a wild and barbarous region lying 
north of the Black and Caspian Seas. His son 
Cambyses succeeded him. 

A kingdom, or an empire, was regarded, in 
ancient days, much in the light of an estate, 
which the sovereign held as a species of prop- 
erty, and which he was to manage mainly with 
a view to the promotion of his own personal ag- 
grandizement and pleasure. A king or an em- 
peror could have more palaces, more money, 
and more wives than other men ; and if he was 
of an overbearing or ambitious spirit, he could 
march into his neighbors^ territories, and after 
gratifying his love of adventure with various 
romantic exploits, and gaining great renown by 
his ferocious impetuosity in battle, he could end 
his expedition, perhaps, by adding his neigh- 
bors' palaces, and treasures, and wives to his 
own. 

Divine Providence, however, the mysterious 
power that overrules all the passions and im- 
pulses of men, and brings extended and general 
good out of local and particular evil, has made 
the ambition and the selfishness of princes the 
great means of preserving order and government 
among men. These great ancient despots, for 
example, would not have been able to collect 
their revenues, or enlist their armies, or pro- 
cure supplies for their campaigns, unless their 
dominions were under a regular and complete 






THE MOTHER OF XERXES. 9 

system of social organization^ such as should al- 
low all the industrial pursuits of coiiunerce and 
of agriculture, throughout the mass of the com- 
munity, to go regularly on. Thus absolute 
monarchs, however ambitious, and selfish, and 
domineering in their characters, have a strong 
personal interest in the establishment of order 
and of justice between man and man throughout 
all the regions which are nnder their swa}^ In 
fact, tlie greater their ambition, their selfish- 
ness, and their pride, the stronger will this in- 
terest be ; for, just in proportion as order, in- 
dustry, and internal tranquillity prevail in a 
country, just in that proportion can revenues 
be collected from it, and armies raised and 
maintained. 

It is a mistake, therefore, to suppose of the 
great heroes, and sovereigns, and conquerors 
that have appeared from time to time among 
mankind, that the usual and ordinary result of 
their influence and action has been that of dis- 
turbance and disorganization. It is true tliat 
a vast amount of disturbance and disorganiza- 
tion has often followed from the march of their 
armies, their sieges, their invasions, and the 
other local and temporary acts of violence which 
they commit ; but these are the exceptions, not 
the rule. It must be that such thins^s are ex- 
ceptions, since in any extended and general 
view of the subject, a much greater amount of 



10 XERXES. 

social organization, industry, and peace is nec- 
essary to raise and maintain an army, than that 
army can itself destroy. The deeds of destruc- 
tion which great conquerors perform attract 
more attention and make a greater impression 
upon mankind than the quiet, patient, and long- 
continued labors by which they perfect and ex- 
tend the general organization of the social state. 
But these labors, though less noticed by men, 
have really employed the energies of great sov- 
ereigns in a far greater degree than mankind 
have generally imagined. Thus we should de- 
scribe the work of Caesar's life in a single word 
more truly by saying that he organized ^nroipe, 
than that he conquered it. His bridges, his 
roads, his systems of jurisprudence, his coin- 
age, his calendar, and other similar means and 
instruments of social arrangement, and facili- 
ties for promoting the pursuits of industry and 
peace, mark, far more properly, the real work 
which that great conqueror performed among 
mankind, than his battles and his victories. 
Darius was, in the same way, the organizer 
of Asia. William the Conqueror completed, or, 
rather, advanced very far towards completing, 
the social organization of England ; and even 
in respect to Napoleon, the true and proper me- 
morial of his career is the successful working 
of the institutions, the systems, and the codes 
which he perfected and introduced into the 



THE MOTHER OF XERXES. 11 

social state, and not the brazen column, formed 
from captured cannon, wliich stands in the 
Place Vendomc. 

These considerations, obviously true, though 
not always borne in mind, are, however, to be 
considered as making the characters, of the great 
sovereigns, in a moral point of view, neitlier the 
worse nor the better. In all that they did, 
whether in arranging and systematizing the 
functions of social life, or in rnthless deeds of 
conquest and destruction, they were actuated, 
in a great measure, by selfish ambition. They 
arranged and organized the social state in order 
to forni a more compact and solid pedestal for 
the foundation of their power. They main- 
tained peace and order among their people, just 
as a master would suppress quarrels among his 
slaves, because peace among laborers is essen- 
tial to productive results. They fixed and de- 
fined legal rights, and established courts to de- 
termine and enforce them ; they protected prop- 
erty ; they counted and classified men ; they 
opened roads ; they built bridges ; they encour- 
aged commerce ; they hung robbers, and ex- 
terminated pirates — all, that the collection of 
their revenues and the enlistment of their arm- 
ies might go on without hindrance or restric- 
tion. Many of them, indeed, may liave been 
animated, in some degree, by a higher and no- 
bler sentiment than this. Some may have felt 



12 XERXES. 

a sort of j^ride in the contemj^lation of a great, 
and prosperous^ and wealthy empire, analogous 
to that which a proprietor feels in surveying a 
well-conditioned, successful, and productive es- 
tate. Others, like Alfred, may have felt a sin- 
cere and honest interest in the welfare of their 
fellow-men, and the promotion of human hap- 
piness may have been, in a greater or less de- 
gree, the direct object of their aim. Still, it 
cannot be denied that a selfish and reckless 
ambition has been, in general, the mainspring 
of action with heroes and conquerors, which, 
while it aimed only at pei'sonal aggrandizement, 
has been made to operate, through the peculiar 
mechanism of the social state which the Divine 
wisdom has contrived, as a means, in the 
main, of preserving and extending peace and 
order among mankind, and not of destroying 
them. 

But to return to Atossa. Her father Cyrus, 
who laid the foundation of the great Persian 
empire, was, for a hero and conqueror, tolerably 
considerate and just, and he desired, probably, 
to promote the welfare and happiness of his mil- 
lions of subjects ; but his son Cambyses, Atos- 
sa's brother, having been brought up in expec- 
tation of succeeding to vast wealth and power, 
and having been, as the sons of the wealthy and 
the powerful often are in all ages of the world, 
wholly neglected by his father during the early 



THE MOTHER OF XERXES. 13 

part of his life, and entirely unaccustomed to 
control, became a wild, reckless, proud, selfish, 
and ungovernable yo-ung man. His father was 
killed suddenly in battle, as has already been 
stated, and Cambyses succeeded him. Cam- 
byses's career was short, desperate, and most 
tragical in its end.* In fact, he was one of 
the most savage, reckless, and abominable mon- 
sters that have ever lived. 

It was the custom in those days for the Per- 
sian monarchs to have many wives, and, what 
is still more remarkable, whenever any monarch 
died, his successor inherited his predecessors 
family as well as his throne. Cyrus had several 
children by his various wives. Cambyses and 
Smerdis were the only sons, but there were 
daughters, among whom Atossa was the most 
distinguished. The ladies of tlie court were 
accustomed to reside in different palaces, or in 
different suites of apartments in the same palace, 
so that they lived in a great measure isolated 
from each other. When Cambyses came to the 
throne, and thus entered into possession of his 
father's palaces, he saw and fell in love with 
one of his father's daughters. He wished to 
make her one of his wives. He was accus- 
tomed to the unrestricted indulgence of every 
appetite and passion, but he seems to have had 

* His history is given in the first chapter of Daeius 
THE Great, 



14 XERXES. 

some slight misgivings in regard to such a step 
as this. He consulted the Persian judges. 
They conferred upon the subject, and then re- 
plied they had searched among the laws of the 
realm, and though they found no law allowing 
a man to marry his sister, they found many 
which authorized a Persian king to do whatever 
he pleased. 

Cambyses therefore added the princess to the 
number of his wives, and not long afterward he 
married another of his father's daughters in the 
same way. One of these princesses was Atossa. 

Cambyses invaded Egypt, and in the course 
of his m.ad career in that country he killed his 
brother Smerdis and one of his sisters, and at 
length was killed himself. Atossa escaped the 
dangers of this stormy and terrible reign, and 
returned safely to Susa after Cambyses's 
death. 

Smerdis, the brother of Cambyses, would 
have been Cambyses's successor if he had sur- 
vived him ; but he had been privately assassi- 
nated by Cambyses's orders, though his death 
had been kept profoundly secret by those who 
had perpetrated the deed. There was another 
Smerdis in Susa, the Persian capital, who was 
a magian — that is, a sort of priest — in whose 
hands, as regent, Cambyses had left the gov- 
ernment while he was absent on his campaigns. 
This magian Smerdis accordingly conceived the 



THE MOTHEK OF XERXES. 15 

plan of usurping the throne, as if he were Smer- 
dis the prince, resorting to a great many ingen- 
ious and cunning schemes to conceal his decep- 
tion. Among his other plans, one was to keep 
himself wholly sequestered from public view, 
with a few favorites, such, especially, as had not 
personally known Smerdis the prince. In the 
same manner he secluded from each other and 
from himself all who had known Smerdis, in 
order to prevent their conferring with one an- 
other, or communicating to each other any sus- 
picions which they might chance to entertain. 
Such seclusion, so far as related to the ladies of 
the royal family, was not unusual after the death 
of a king, and Smerdis did not deviate from the 
ordinary custom, except to make the isolation 
and confinement of the princesses and queens 
more rigorous and strict than common. By 
means of this policy he was enabled to go on for 
some months without detection, living all the 
while in the greatest luxury and splendor, but 
at the same time in absolute seclusion, and in 
unceasing anxiety and fear. 

One chief source of his solicitude was lest he 
should be detected by means of his eai^s ! Some 
years before, when he was in a comparatively 
obscure position, he had in someway or otlier 
offended his sovereign, and was punished by 
having his ears cut off. It was necessary, there- 
fore, to kee]! the marks of this mutilation care- 



16 XERXES. 

fully concealed by means of his hair and his 
head-dress, and even with these precautions he 
could never feel perfectly secure. 

At last one of the nobles of the court, a sa- 
gacious and observing man, suspected the im- 
posture. He had no access to Smerdis himself, 
but his daughter, whose name was Phgedyma, 
was one of Smerdis^s wives. The nobleman 
was excluded from all direct intercourse with 
Smerdis, and even with his daughter ; but he 
contrived to send word to his daughter, inquir- 
ing whether her husband was the true Smerdis 
or not. She replied that she did not know, in- 
asmuch as she had never seen any other Smer- 
dis, if, indeed, there had been another. The 
nobleman then attempted to communicate with 
Atossa, but he found it impossible to do so. 
Atossa had, of course, known her brother well, 
and was on that very account very closely se- 
cluded by the magian. As a last resort, the 
nobleman sent to liis daughter a request that 
she would watch for an opportunity to feel for 
her husband^s ears while he was asleep. He 
admitted that this would be a dangerous at- 
tempt, but his daughter, he said, ought to be 
willing to make it, since, if her pretended hus- 
band were really an impostor, she ought to 
take even a stronger interest than others in his 
detection. Phaedyma was at first afraid to un- 
dertake so dangerous a commission ; but she at 



THE MOTHER OF XERXES. 17 

length ventured to do so, and, by passing licr 
hand under his turban one night, while he was 
sleeping on his couch, she found that the ears 
were gone.* 

The consequence of this discovery was, that a 
conspiracy was formed to dethrone and destroy 
the usurper. The plot was successful. Smerdis 
was killed ; his imprisoned queens were set 
free, and Darius was raised to the throne in his 
stead. 

Atossa now, by that strange principle of suc- 
cession which has been already alluded to, be- 
came the wdfe of Darius, and she figures fre- 
quently and conspicuously in history during 
his long and splendid reign. 

Her name is brought into notice in one case 
in a remarkable manner, in connection with an 
expedition wdiich Darius sent on an exploring 
tour into Greece and Italy. She was herself 
the means, in fact, of sending the expedition. 
She was sick ; and after suffering secretly and 
in silence as long as possible — the nature of 
her complaint being such as to make her un- 
willing to speak of it to others — she at length 
determined to consult a Greek physician who 
had been brought to Persia as a captive, and 
had acquired great celebrity at Susa by his 

* For a niore particular account of the transaction 
see tho ]iist<:>vy of Darius. 

2— Xerxe.; 



18 XERXES. 

medical science and skill. The physican said 
thab he would undertake her case on condition 
that she would promise to grant him a certain 
request that he would make. She wished to 
know what it was beforehand, but the physician 
would not tell her. He said, however, that it 
was nothing that it would be in any way de- 
rogatory to her honor to grant him. 

On these conditions Atossa concluded to 
agree to the physician^s proposals. He made 
her take a solemn oath that, if he cured her of 
her malady, she would do whatever he required 
of her, provided that it was consistent with 
honor and propriety. He then took her case 
under his charge, prescribed for her and attend- 
ed her, and in due time she was cured. The 
physician then told her that what he wished 
her to do for him was to find some means to 
persuade Darius to send him home to his native 
land. 

Atossa was faithful in fulfilling her promise. 
She took a private opportunity, when she was 
alone with Darius, to propose that he should 
engage in some plans of foreign conquest. 
She reminded him of the vastness of the mili- 
tary power which was at his disposal, and of the 
facility with which, by means of it, he might 
extend his dominions. She extolled, too, his 
genius and energy, and endeavored to inspire 
in his mind some ambitious desires to distin- 



THE MOTHER OF XERXES. 19 

guisli himself in the estiiiKiiiuii ol' nuuikind by 
bringing his cai">acities for the performance of 
great deeds into action. 

Darius listened to these suggestions of A tossa 
with interest and with evident pleasure, lie 
said that he had been forming some such 
plans himself. He was going to build a bridge 
across the Hellespont or the Bosporus, to unite 
Europe and Asia ; and he was also going to 
make an incursion into the country of the Scy- 
thians., the people by whom Cyrus, his great 
predecessor, had been defeated and slain. It 
would be a great glory for him, he said, to suc- 
ceed in a conquest in which Cyrus had so totally 
failed. 

But these plans would not answer the pur- 
pose which Atossa had in view. She urged 
her husband, therefore, to postjione his inva- 
sion of the Scythians till some future time, and 
first conquer the Greeks, and annex their terri- 
tory to his dominions. The Scythians, she 
said, were savages, and their country not worth 
the cost of conquering it, while Greece would 
constitute a noble prize. She urged the inva- 
sion of Greece, too, rather than Scythia, as a 
personal favor to herself, for she had been 
wanting, she said, some slaves from Greece for 
a long time — some of the women of Sparta, of 
Corinth, and of Athens, of whose graces and 
accomplishments she had heard so much. 



20 XERXES. 

There was sometbiiig gratifying to the mili- 
tary vanity of Darius in being thus requested 
to maiie an incursion to another continent^ and 
undertake the conquest of the mightiest nation 
of the earth, for the purpose of procuring ac- 
complished waiting-maids to offer as a present 
to his queen. He became restless and excited 
while listening to Atossa's proposals, and to 
the arguments with which she enforced them, 
and it was obvious that he was very strongly in- 
clined to accede to her views. He finally con- 
cluded to send a commission into Greece to ex- 
plore the country, and to bring back a report 
on their return ; and as he decided to make the 
Greek physician the guide of the exjoedition, 
Atossa gained her end. 

A full account of this expedition, aud of the 
various adventures which the party met with 
on their voyage, is given in our history of Da- 
rius. It may be proper to say here, however, 
that the physician fully succeeded in his plans 
of making his escape. He pretended, at first, 
to be unwilling to go ; and he made only the 
most temporary arrangements in respect to the 
conduct of his affairs while he should be gone, 
in order to deceive the king in regard to his 
intentions of not returning. The king, on his 
part, resorted to some stratagems to ascertain 
whether the physician was sincere in his pro- 
fessions, but he did noi succeed in detecting 



THE MOTHER OF XERXES. 21 

tlie artifice, and so the party went away. The 
physician never returned. 

Atossa had tour sons. Xerxes was the eldest 
of them. He was not, however, the eldest of 
the sons of Darius, as there were other sons, 
the children of another wife, whom Darius had 
married before he ascended the throne. The 
oldest of these children was named Artoba- 
zanes. Artobazanes seems to have been a prince 
of an amiable and virtuous character, and not 
particularly ambitious and aspiring in his dis- 
position, although as he was the eldest son of his 
father, he claimed to be his heir. Atossa did 
not admit the validity of this claim, but main- 
tained that the eldest of her children was en- 
titled to the inheritance. 

It became necessary to decide this question 
before Darius's death ; for Darius, in the pros- 
ecution of a war in which he was engaged, 
formed the design of accompanying his army 
on an expedition into Greece, and, before doing 
this, he was bound, according to the laws and 
usages of the Persian realm, to regulate the 
succession. 

There immediately arose an earnest dispute 
between the friends and partisans of Artobaza- 
nes and Xerxes, each side urging very eagerly 
the claims of its own candidate. The mother 
and the friends of Artobazanes maintained that 
he was the oldest son, and, consequently, the 



22 XERXES. 

heir. Atossa, on the other hand, contended 
that Xerxes was the grandson of Cyrus, and 
that he derived from that circumstance the 
highest possible hereditary rights to the Persian 
throne. 

This was in some respects true, for Cyrus 
had been the founder of the empire and the le- 
gitimate monarch, while Darius had no heredi- 
tary claims. He was originally a noble, of high 
rank, indeed, but not of the royal line ; and he 
had been designated as Cyruses successor in a 
time of revolution, because there was, at that 
time, no prince of the royal family who could 
take the inheritance. Those, therefore, who 
were disposed to insist on the claims of a legit- 
imate hereditary succession, might very plaus- 
ibly claim that Darius's government had been 
a regency rather than a reign ; tliafc Xerxes, "be- 
ing the oldest son of Atossa, Cyrns^'s daughter, 
was the true representative of the royal line ; 
and that, although it might not be expedient 
to disturb the possession of Darius during his 
lifetime, yet that, at his death, Xerxes was un- 
questionably entitled to the throne. 

There was obviously a great deal of truth and 
justice in this reasoning, and yet it was a view 
of the subject not likely to be very agreeable 
to Darius, since it seemed to deny the existence 
of any real and valid title to the sovereignty in 
him. It assigned the crown, at his death, not 



THE MOTHER OF XERXES. 23 

to his son as sucli, but to his predecessor's grand- 
son ; for though Xerxes was both the son of 
Dariiis and the grandson of Cyrus, it was in tlie 
latter capacity that he was regarded as entitled 
to the crown in the argument referred to above. 
The doctrine was very gratifying to the pride 
of Atossa, for it made Xerxes the successor to 
the crown as her son and heir, and not as the 
son and heir of her husband. For this very 
reason it was likely to be not very gratifying to 
Darius. He hesitated very much in respect to 
adopting it. Atossa's ascendency over his mind, 
and her influence generally in the Persian court, 
was almost overwhelming, — and yet Darius was 
very unwilling to seem, by giving to the oldest 
grandson of Cyrus the precedence over his own 
eldest son, to admit that he himself had no 
legitimate and proper title to the throne. 

While things were in this state, a Greek, 
named Demaratus, arrived at Susa. He was a 
dethroned prince from Sparta, and had fled from 
the political storms of his own country to seek 
refuge in Darius's capital. Demaratus found 
a way to reconcile Darius's pride as a sovereign 
with his personal preferences as a husband and 
a father. He told the king that, according to 
the principles of hereditary succession which 
were adopted in Greece, Xerxes was his heir as 
well as Cyrus's, for he was the oldest son who 
was born after his accession. A son, lie said. 



24 



XERXES. 



according to the Greek ideas on the subject, 
was entitled to inherit only such rank as his 
father held when the son was born ; and that^ 
consequently, none of his children who had been 
born before his accession could have any claims 
to the Persian throne. Artobazanes, in a word, 
was to be regarded, he said, only as the son of 
Darius the noble, while Xerxes was the son of 
Darius the king. 

In the end Darius adopted this view, and des- 
ignated Xerxes as his successor in case he should 
not return from his distant expedition. He 
did not return. He did not even live to set out 
upon it. Perhaps the question of the succession 
had not been absolutely and finally settled, for 
it arose again and was discussed anew when the 
death of Darius occurred. The manner in 
which it was finally disposed of will be described 
in the next chapter. 




The Sphinx. 




CHAPTER II. 

EGYPT AND GllEECE. 

The arrangements which Darius had made 
to fix and determine the succession, before 
his death, did not entirely prevent the question 
from arising again when his death occurred. 
Xerxes was on the spot at the time, and at once 
assumed the royal functions. His brother was 
absent. Xerxes sent a messenger to Artoba- 
zanes * informing him of their father's death, 
and of his intention of assuming the crown. He 
said, however, that if he did so, he should give 
his brother the second rank, making him, in all 
respects, next to himself in office and honor. 
He sent, moreover, a great many splendid pres- 
ents to Artobazanes, to evince the friendly re- 
gard which he felt for him, and to propitiate 
his favor. 

Artobazanes sent back word to Xerxes that 
he thanked him for his presents, and that he 
accepted them with pleasure. He said that he 

♦Plutarch, who gives an account of these occur- 
rences, varies the orthography of tlie name. We, 
however, retain the name as given by Herodotus. 



26 XERXES. 

considered himself, nevertheless, as jnstly en- 
titled to the crown, though he should, in the 
event of his accession, treat all his brothers and 
especially Xerxes, with the utmost considera- 
tion and respect. 

Soon after these occurrences, Artobazanes 
came to Media, where Xerxes was, and the 
question which of them should be the king was 
agitated anew among the nobles of the court. 
In the end, a public hearing of the cause was 
had before Artabanus, a brother of Darius, and, 
of course, an uncle of the contending princes. 
The question seems to have been referred to 
him, either because he held some public office 
which made it his duty to consider and decide 
such a question, or else because he had been 
specially commissioned to act as judge in this 
particular case. Xerxes was at first quite nn- 
willing to submit his claims to the decision of 
such a tribunal. The crown was, as he main- 
tained, rightfully his. He thought that the 
public voice was generally in his favor. Then, 
besides he was already in possession of the 
throne, and by consenting to plead his cause be- 
fore his nncle, he seemed to be virtually aban- 
doning all this vantage ground, and trusting 
Instead to the mere chance of Artabanus's 
decision. 

Atossa, however, recommended to him to ac- 
cede to the plan of referring the question to Ar- 



EGYPT AND GREECE. 27 

tabanus. He would consider the subject, she 
said, with fairness and impartiality, and decide 
it right. She had no doubt that he would de- 
cide it in Xerxes^s favor ; '^ and if he does not/' 
she added, ^'and you lose your cause, you only 
become the second man in the kingdom instead 
of the first, and the difference is not so very 
great, after all.'' 

Atossa may have had some secret intimation 
how Artabanus would decide. 

However this may be, Xerxes at length con- 
cluded to submit the question. A solemn court 
was held, and the case was argued in the pres- 
ence of all the nobles and great officers of state. 
A throne was at hand to which the successful 
competitor was to be conducted as soon as the 
decision should be made, Artabanus heard the 
arguments, and decided in favor of Xerxes. 
Artobazanes, his brother, acquiesced in the de- 
cision with the utmost readiness and good hu- 
mor. He was the first to bow before the king 
in token of homage, and conducted him, him- 
self, to the throne. 

Xerxes kept his promise faithfully of making 
his brother the second in his kingdom. He ajj- 
pointed him to a very high command in the 
army, and Artobazanes, on his part, served the 
king with great zeal and fidelity, until he was 
at last killed in battle, in the manner hereafter 
to be described. 



28 XERXES. 

As soon as Xerxes found himself established 
on his throne, he was called upon to decide im- 
mediately a great question, namely, which of 
two important wars in which his father had 
been engaged he should first undertake to pros- 
ecute, the war in Egypt or the war in Greece. 

By referring to the map, the reader will see 
that, as the Persian empire extended westward 
to Asia Minor and to the coasts of the Mediter- 
ranean Sea, the great countries which bordered 
upon it in this direction were, on the north 
Greece, and on the south, Egypt ; the one in 
Europe, and the other in Africa. The Greeka 
and the Egyptians were both wealthy and pow^ 
erful, and the countries which they respectively 
inhabited were fertile and beautiful beyond ex- 
pression, and yet in all their essential feature?, 
and characteristics they were extremely dissim- 
ilar. Egypt was a long and narrow inland 
valley. Greece rej^osed, as it were, in the bo- 
som of the sea, consisting, as it did, of an end' 
less number of islands, promontories, peninsu. 
las, and winding coasts, laved on every side hy 
the blue waters of the Mediterranean. Egypt 
was a plain, diversified only by the varieties of 
vegetation, and by the towns and villages, and 
the enormous monumental structures which 
had been erected by man. Greece was a pictur- 
esque and ever-changing scene of mountaina 
and valleys ; of precipitous cliffs, winding 



EGYPT AND GREECE. 29 

beaches, rocky capes, and lofty headlands. 
The character and genius of the inhabitants of 
these two countries took their cast, in each 
case, from the physical conformations of the 
soil. The Egyptians were a quiet, gentle, and 
harmless race of tillers of the ground. They 
spent their lives in pumping water from the 
river, in the patient, persevering toil of sow- 
ing smooth and mellow fields, or in reaping 
the waving grain. The Greeks drove flocks 
and herds up and down the declivities of the 
mountains, or hunted wild beasts in forests and 
fastnesses. They constructed galleys for navigat- 
ing the seas ; they worked the mines and man- 
ufactured metals. They built bridges, citadels, 
temples, and towns, and sculptured statuary 
from marble blocks which they chiseled from 
the strata of the mountains. It is surprising 
what a difference is made in the genius and 
character of man by elevations, here and there, 
of a few thousand feet in the country where his 
genius and character are formed. 

The architectural wonders of Egypt and of 
Greece were as diverse from each other as the 
natural features of the soil, and in each case 
the structures were in keeping and in harmony 
with the character of the landscape which they 
respectively adorned. The harmony was, how- 
ever, that of contrast, and not of correspond- 
ence. In Greece, where the landscape itself 



30 XERXES. 

was grand and sublime, the architect aimed 
only at beauty. To have aimed at magnitude 
and grandeur in human structures among the 
mountains, the cliffs, the cataracts, and the re- 
sounding ocean shores of Greece, would have 
been absurd. The Grecian artists were de- 
terred by their unerring instincts from the at- 
tempt. They accordingly built beautiful tem- 
ples, whose white and symmetrical colonnades 
adorned the declivities, or crowned the summits 
of the hills. They sculptured statues, to be 
placed on pedestals in groves and gardens ; they 
constructed fountains ; they raised bridges and 
aqueducts on long ranges of arches and piers ; 
and the summits of ragged rocks crystallized, 
as it were, under their hands into towers, bat- 
tlements, and walls. In Egypt, on the other 
hand, where the country itself was a level and 
unvarying plain, the architecture took forms of 
prodigious magnitude, of lofty elevation, and 
of vast extent. There were ranges of enormous 
columns, colossal statues, towering obelisks, 
and pyramids rising like mountains from the 
verdure of the plain. Thus, while nature gave 
to the country its elements of beauty, man 
completed the landscape by adding to it the 
grand and the sublime. 

The shape and proportions of Egypt would 
be represented by a green ribbon an inch wide 
and a yard long, lying upon the ground in a 



EGPPT AND GllEECE. 31 

serpentine form ; jinil to complete the model, 
we might imagine a silver filament passing along 
the center of the green to denote the Nile. 
The real valley of verdure, however, is not of 
uniform breadth, like the ribbon so represent- 
ing it, but widens as it approaches the sea, as 
if there had been originally a gulf or estuary 
there, which the sediment from the river had 
filled. 

In fact, the rich and fertile plain which the 
alluvial deposits of the Nile have formed, has 
been protruded for some distance into the sea, 
and the stream divides itself into three great 
branches about a hundred miles from its mouth, 
two outermost of which, with the sea-coast in 
front, inclose a vast triangle, which was called 
the Delta, from the Greek letter delta, A, 
which is of a triangular form. In ascending 
the river beyond the Delta, the fertile plain, at 
first twenty-five or thirty miles wide, grows 
gradually narrower, as the ranges of barren 
hills and tracts of sandy deserts on either hand 
draw nearer and nearer to the river. Thus 
the country consists of two long lines of rich 
and fertile intervals, one on each side of the 
stream. In the time of Xerxes the whole ex- 
tent was densely populated, every little eleva- 
tion of the land being covered with a village or 
a town. The inhabitants tilled the land, rais- 
ing upon it vast stores of corn, much of which 

3— X.rxi-s 



82 XERXES. 

was floated down the river to its mouth, and 
taken thence to various countries of Europe and 
Asia, in merchant ships, over the Mediterranean 
Sea. Caravans, too, sometimes came across the 
neighboring deserts to obtain supplies of Egyp- 
tian corn. This was done by the sons of Jacob 
when the crops failed them in the land of 
Canaan, as related in the sacred Scriptures. 

There were two great natural wonders in 
Egypt in ancient times as now : first, it never 
rained there, or, at least, so seldom, that rain 
was regarded as a marvelous phenomenon, in- 
terrupting the ordinary course of nature, like 
an earthquake in England or America. The 
falling of drops of water out of clouds in the 
sky was an occurrence so strange, so unaccount- 
able, that the whole population regarded it 
with astonishment and awe. With the excep- 
tion of these rare and wonder-exciting instances, 
there was no rain, no snow, no hail, no clouds 
in the sky. The sun was always shining, and 
the heavens were always serene. These meteor- 
ological characteristics of the country, result- 
ing as they do, from permanent natural causes, 
continue, of course, unchanged to the present 
day ; and the Arabs who live now along the 
banks of the river, keep their crops, when har- 
vested, in heaps in the open air, and require 
no roofs to their huts except a light covering 
of sheaves to protect the inmates from the sun. 



EGYPT AND GREECE. 33 

The other natural wonder of Egypt was the 
annual rising of the Nile. About midsummer, 
the peasantry who lived along the banks would 
find the river gradually beginning to rise. The 
stream became more turbid, too, as the bosom 
of the waters swelled. No cause for this mys- 
terious increase appeared, as the sky remained 
as blue and serene as before, and the sun, then 
nearly vertical, continued to shine with even 
more than its wonted splendor. The inhabi- 
tants, however, felt no surprise, and asked for 
no explanation of the phenomenon. It was the 
common course of nature at that season. They 
had all witnessed it, year after year, from 
childhood. They, of course, looked for it when 
the proper month came round, and, though 
they would have been amazed if tlie annual 
flood had failed, they thought nothing extraor- 
dinary of its coming. 

When the swelling of the waters and the grad- 
ual filling of the channels and low grounds in 
the neighborhood of the river warned tlie people 
that the flood was at hand, they all engaged 
busily in the work of completing their prep- 
arations. The harvests were all gathered from 
tlie fields, and the vast stores of fruit and corn 
which they yielded were piled in roofless gran- 
aries, built on every elevated spot of ground, 
where they would be safe from the approach- 
ing inundation. The rise of the water was very 



34 XERXES. 

gradual and slow. KStreams began to flow in 
all directions over the land. Ponds and lakes, 
growing every day more and more extended, 
spread mysteriously over the surface of the 
meadows ; and all the time while this deluge 
of water was rising to submerge the land, the 
air continued dry, the sun was sultry, and the 
sky was without a cloud. 

As the flood continued to rise, the proportion 
of land and water, and the conformation of the 
irregular and temporary shores which separated 
them, were changed continually, from day to 
day. The inhabitants assembled in their vil- 
lages, which were built on rising grounds, some 
natural, others artificially formed. The waters 
rose more and more, until only these crowded 
islands appeared above its surface — when, at 
length, the valley presented to the view the 
spectacle of a vast expanse of water calm as a 
summer's sea, brilliant with the reflected rays of 
a tropical sun, and canopied by a sky, which, dis- 
playing its spotless blue by day and its countless 
stars at night, was always cloudless and serene. 

The inundation was at its height in October. 
After that period the waters gradually subsid- 
ed, leaving a slimy and very fertilizing deposit 
all over the lands which they had covered. 
Though the inhabitants themselves, who had 
been accustomed to this overflow from infancy, 
felt no wonder or curiosity about its cause, the 



EGYPT AND GREECE. 35 

philosophers of the day, and travelers from other 
countries who visited Egypt, made many at- 
tempts to seek an explanation of the phenome. 
non. They had three theories on the subject, 
which Herodotus mentions and discusses. 

The first explanation was, that tlie rising of 
the river was occasioned by the prevalence of 
northerly winds on the Mediterranean at that 
time of the year, which drove back the waters 
at the mouth of the river, and so caused the ac- 
cumulation of the water in the upper parts of 
the valley. Herodotus thought that this was 
not a satisfactory explanation ; for sometimes, 
as he said, these northerly winds did not blow, 
and yet the rising of the river took place none 
the less when the appointed season came. Be- 
sides, there were other rivers similarly situated 
in respect to the influence of prevailing winds 
at sea in driving in their waters at at their 
mouths, which were, nevertheless, not subject 
to inundations like the Nile. 

The second theory was, that the Nile took 
its rise, not, like other rivers, in inland lakes, 
or among inland mountains, but in someremoce 
and unknown ocean on the other side of the 
continent, which ocean the advocates of this 
theory supposed might be subject to some great 
annual ebb and flow ; and from this it might 
result that at stated periods an unusual tide of 
waters might be poured into the channel of the 



36 XERXES. 

river. This, however, could not be true, for 
the waters of the inundation were fresh, not 
salt, which proved that they were not furnished 
by any ocean. 

A third hypothesis v/as, that the rising of 
the water was occasioned by the melting of the 
snows in summer on the mountains from which 
the sources of the river came. Against this sup- 
position Herodotus found more numerous and 
more satisfactory reasons even than he had ad- 
vanced against the others. In the first place, the 
river came from the south — a direction in which 
the heat increased in intensity with every league, 
as far as travelers had explored it ; and beyond 
those limits, they supposed that the burning 
sun made the country uninhabitable. It was 
preposterous to suppose that there could be 
snow and ice there. Then, besides, the Nile 
had been ascended to a great distance, and re- 
ports from the natives had been brought down 
from regions still more remote, and no tidings 
had ever been brought of ice and snow. It was 
unreasonable, therefore, to suppose that the 
inundations could arise from such a cause. 

These scientific theories, however, were dis- 
cussed only among philosophers and learned men. 
The common people had a much more simple and 
satisfactory mode of disposing of the subject. 
They, in their imaginations, invested the bene- 
ficent river with a sort of life and personality, 



EGYPT AND GREECE. 37 

and when thoy saw its waters rising so gently 
but yet surely, to overflow their whole land, 
leaving it, as they withdrew again, endued 
with a new and exuberant fertility, they im- 
agined it a living and acting intelligence, that 
in the exercise ot some mysterious and inscru- 
table powers, the nature ol which was to them 
unknown, and impelled by a kind and friendly 
regard for the country and its inhabitants, came 
annually, of its own accord, to spread over the 
land the blessings of fertility and abundance. 
The mysterious stream being viewed in this 
light, its wonderful powers awakened their ven- 
eration and awe, and its boundless beneficence 
their gratitude. 

Among the ancient Egyptian legends, there 
is one relating to a certain King Pheron which 
strikingly illustrates this feeling. It seems 
that during one of the inundations, while he 
was standing with his courtiers and watching the 
flow ot the water, the commotion in the stream 
was much greater than usual on account of a 
strong wind which was blowing at that time, and 
which greatly increased the violence of the 
whirlpools, and the force and swell of the boil- 
ing eddies. There was given, in fact, to the ap- 
pearance of the river an expression of anger, 
and Pheron, who was of a proud and haughty 
character, like most of tlie Egyptian kings, 
threw his Javelin into one of the wildest of the 



88 XERXES. 

whirlpools, as a token of his defiance of its rage. 
He was instantly struck blind ! 

The sequel of the story is curious, though it 
has no connection with the personality of the 
Nile. Pheron remained blind or ten years. 
At the end of that time it was announced to 
him, by some supernatural communication, 
that the period of his punishment had expired, 
and that his sight might be brought back to 
him by the employment of a certain designated 
means of restoration, which was the bathing of 
his eyes by a strictly virtuous woman. Pheron 
undertook compliance with the requisition, 
without any idea that the finding of a virtuous 
woman would be a difficult task. He first tried 
his own wife, but her bathing produced no ef- 
fect. He then tried, one after another, various 
ladies of his court, and afterward others of dif- 
ferent rank and station, selecting those who 
were most distinguished for the excellence of 
their characters. He was disappointed, however, 
in them all. The blindness continued un- 
changed. At last, however, he found the wife 
of a peasant, whose bathing produced the effect. 
The monarches sight was suddenly restored. 
The king rewarded the peasant woman, whose 
virtuous character was established by this in- 
disputable test, with the highest honors. The 
others he collected together, and then shut them 
up in one of his towns. AVhen they were all thus 



EGYPT AND Gil EEC E. 39 

safely imprisoned, he set the town on fire, and 
burned them all up together. 

To return to the Nile. Certain columns were 
erected in different parts of the valley, on which 
cubits and the subdivisions of cubits were 
marked and numbered, for the purpose of as- 
certaining precisely the rise of the water. Such 
a columri was called a Nilometer. There was 
one near Memphis, which was at the upper 
point of the Delta, and others further up the 
river. Such pillars continue to be used to 
mark the height of the inundations to the 
present day. 

The object of thus accurately ascertaining 
the rise of the water was not mere curiosity, 
for there were certain important business oper- 
ations which depended upon the results. The 
fertility and productiveness of the soil each 
year were determined almost wholly by the ex- 
tent of the inundation ; and as the ability of the 
people to pay tribute depended upon their crops, 
the Xilometer furnished the government with 
a criterion by which they regulated the annual 
assessments of the taxes. There were certain 
canals, too, made to convey the water to dis- 
tant tracts of land, which were opened or kept 
closed according as the water rose to a higher or 
lower point. All these things were regulated by 
the indications of the Kilometer. 

Egypt was famed in the days of Xerxes for 



40 XERXES. 

those enormous structures and ruins of struc- 
tures ^vhose origin was then, as noY\% lost in a 
remote antiquity. Herodotus found the Pyra- 
mids standing in his day, and presenting the 
same spectacle of mysterious and solitary gran- 
deur which they exhibited to Napoleon. He 
speculated on their origin and their history, 
just as the philosophers and travelers of our day 
do. In fact, he knew less and could learn less 
about them than is known now. It helps to im- 
press our minds with an idea of the extreme 
antiquity of these and the otlier architec- 
tural wonders of Egypt, to compare them with 
things which are considered old in the Western 
world. The ancient and venerable colleges and 
halls of Oxford and Cambridge are, many of 
them, two or three hundred years old. There 
are remains of the old wall of the city of London 
which has been standing seven hundred years. 
This is considered a great antiquity. There 
are, however, Eoman ruins in Britain, and in 
various parts of Europe, more ancient still. 
They have been standing eighteen hundred 
years ! People look upon these with a species 
of wonder and awe that they have withstood the 
destructive influences of time so long. But as 
to the Pyramids, if we go back twenty -five liuyi- 
dred years, we find travelers visiting and de- 
scribing them then — monuments as ancient, as 
venerable, as mysterious and unknown in their 



EGYPT AND GREECE. 41 

eyes, as they appear now in ours. We judge 
that a mountaiu is very distant when, after 
traveling many miles toward it, it seems still as 
distant as ever. Xow, in tracing the history 
of the pyramids, the obelisks, the gigantic 
statues, and the vast columnar ruins of the 
Nile, we may go back twenty-five hundred years, 
without, apparently, making any progress what- 
ever toward reaching their origin. 

Such was Egypt. Isolated as it was from 
the rest of the world, and full of fertility and 
riches, it offered a marked and definite object 
to the ambition of a conqueror. In fact, on ac- 
count of the peculiar interest which this long 
and narrow valley of verdure, with its wonderful 
structures, the strange and anomalous course 
of nature which prevails in it, and the extraor- 
dinary phases which human life, in consequence, 
exhibits there, has always excited among man- 
kind, heroes and conquerors have generally con- 
sidered it a peculiarly glorious field for their 
exploits. Cyrus, the founder of the Persian 
monarchy, contemplated the subjugation of it. 
He did nofc carry his designs into effect, but 
left them for Cambyses his son. Darius held 
the country as a dependency during his reign, 
thougl), near the close of his life, it revolted. 
This revolt took place while he was preparing 
for his grand expedition against Greece, and he 
was perplexed with the question which of the 



42 XEKXES. 

two undertakings, the subjugation of the Egyp- 
tians or the invasion of Greece, he should first 
engage in. In the midst of this uncertainty he 
suddenly died, leaving both the wars themselves 
and, the perplexity of deciding between them 
as a part of the royal inheritance falling to his 
son. 

Xerxes decided to prosecute the Egyptian 
campaign first, intending to postpone the con- 
quest of Greece till he had brought the valley of 
the Nile once more under Persian sway. He 
deemed it dangerous to leave a province of his 
father's empire in a state of successful rebellion, 
while leading: his armies oif to new undertak- 
ings. Mardonius, who was the commander-in- 
chief of the army, and the great general on 
whom Xerxes mainly relied for tlie execution 
of his schemes, was very reluctant to consent 
to this plan. He was impatient for the con- 
quest of Greece. There was little glory for him 
to acquire in merely suppressing a revolt, and 
reconquering \vhat had been already once sub- 
dued. He was eager to enter upon a new field. 
Xerxes, however, overruled his wishes, and the 
armies commenced their march for Egypt. 
They passed the land of Judea on their way, 
where the captives who had returned from Bab- 
ylon, and their successors, were rebuilding the 
cities and reoccupying the country. Xerxes 
confirmed them in the j^rivileges which Cyrus 



EGYPT AND GREECE. 



43 



and Darius had granted tbcni, and aided them 
in their work, lie then went on toward tlic 
Nile. The rebellion was easily put down. In 
less than a year from the time of leaving Susa, 




Rebuilding a City of Judea. 
he had reconquered the whole land of Egypt, 
punished the leaders of the revolt, established 
his brother as viceroy of the country, and re- 
turned in safety to Susa. 

All this took place in the second year of liis 
reigu. 




CHAPTEE III. 



DEBATE OK THE PROPOSED INVASION OF GREECE. 



The two great counselors on whose jnclg- 
ment Xerxes mainly relied, so far as he looked 
to any other judgment than his own in tlie 
formation of his plans, were Artabanus, the 
uncle by whose decision the throne had been 
awarded to him, and Mardonius, the command- 
er-in-chief of his armies. Xerxes himself was 
quite a young man, of a proud and lofty, yet 
generous character, and full of self-confidence 
and hope. Mardonius was much older, but he 
was a soldier by profession, and was eager to 
distinguish himself in some great military cam- 
paign. It has always been unfortunate for the 
peace and happiness of mankind, under all mon- 
archical and despotic governments, in every 
age of the World, that, through some depraved 
and unaccountable perversion of public senti- 
ment, those who are not born to greatness have 
had no means of attaining to it except as heroes 
in war. Many men have, indeed, by their men- 
tal powers or their moral excellences, acquired 
44 



THE DEBATE. 45 

ail cxteiulud and lasting- ^>o^7A?^;//o/^v fame ; }>ut 
in respect to all iiuniediato and exalted distinc- 
tion and honor, it will be found, on reviewing 
the history of the human race, that there have 
generally been but two possible avenues to 
them : on the one hand, high birth, and on the 
other, the performance of great deeds of carnage 
and destruction. There must be, it seems, as 
tlie only valid claim to renown, either blood in- 
herited or blood shed. The glory of the latter 
is second, indeed, to that of the former, but it 
is only second. He who has sacked a city stands 
very high in the estimation of his fellows. lie 
yields precedence only to him whose grand- 
father sacked one. 

This state of things is now, it is true, rap- 
idly undergoing a change. The age of chivalry, 
of military murder and robbery, and of the glo- 
ry of great deeds of carnage and blood, is pass- 
ing away, and that of peace, of industry, and 
of achievements for promoting the comfort and 
happiness of mankind is coming. The men 
who are now advancing to the notice of the 
world are those who, through their commerce 
or their manufactures, feed and clothe their fel- 
low-men by millions, or, by opening new chan- 
nels or new means for international intercourse, 
nivilize savages, and people deserts ; while the 
glory of killing and destroying is less and less 
regarded, and more and more readily forgotten. 

4— Xerxes 



46 XEKXES. 

In the days of Xerxes, however, there was no 
road to honor but by war, and Mardonius found 
that his only hope of rising to distinction was 
by conducting a vast torrent of military devas- 
tation over some portion of the globe ; and the 
fairer, the richer, the happier the scene which 
he was thus to inundate and overwhelm, the 
greater would be the glory. He was very much 
disposed, therefore, to urge on the invasion of 
Greece by every means in his power. 

Arfcabanus, on the other hand, the uncle of 
Xerxes, was a man advanced in years, and of a 
calm and cautious disposition. He was better 
aware than younger men of the vicissitudes and 
hazards of war, and was much more inclined 
to restrain tlian to urge on the youthful am- 
bition of his nephew. Xerxes had been able 
to present some show of reason for his campaign 
in Egypt, by calling the resistance w^hich that 
country offered to his power a rebellion. Tliere 
was, however, no such reason in the case of 
Greece. There had been two wars between 
Persia and the Athenians already, it is true. 
In the first, the Athenians had aided their coun- 
trymen in Asia Minor in a fruitless attempt to 
recover their independence. This the Persian 
government considered as aiding and abetting a 
rebellion. In the second, the Persians under 
Datis, one of Darius's generals, had undertaken 
a grand invasion of Greece, and, after landing 



THE DEBATE. 47 

ill the neighborhood of Athens, were beaten', 
with immense slaughter, at the great battle of 
Marathon, near that city. The former of these 
wars is known in history as the Ionian rebel- 
lion ; the latter as the first Persian invasion of 
Greece. They had both occurred during the 
reign of Darius, and the invasion under l)atis 
had taken place not many years before the ac- 
cession of Xerxes, so that a great number of 
the officers who had served in that campaign 
were still remaining in the court and army of 
Xerxes at Susa. These wars had, however, 
both been terminated, and Artabanus was very 
little inclined to have the contests renewed. 

Xerxes, however, was bent npon making one 
more attem^Dt to conquer Greece, and when the 
time arrived for commencing his preparations, 
he called a grand council of the generals, tlie 
nobles, and the potentates of the realm, to lay 
his plans before them. The historian who nar- 
rated these proceedings recorded the debate 
that ensued in the following manner. 

Xerxes himself first addressed the assembly, 
to announce and explain his designs. 

^^The enterprise, my friends," said he, ^^in 
which I propose now to engage, and in which I 
am about to ask your co-operation, is no new 
scheme of my own devising. What I design to 
do is, on the other hand, only the carrying for- 
ward of the grand course of measures marked 



48 XERXES. 

out by my predecessors, and pursued by them 
Avith steadiness and energy, so long as the power 
remained in their hands. That power has 
now descended to me, and with it has devolved 
the responsibility of finishing the work which 
they so successfully began. 

^'It is the manifest destiny of Persia to rule 
the world. From the time that Cyrus first 
commenced the work of conquest by subduing 
Media, to the present day, the extent of our em- 
pire has been continually widening, until now 
it covers all of Asia and Africa, with the excep- 
tion of the remote and barbarous tribes, that, 
like the wild beasts which share their forests 
with tliem, are not worth the trouble of subdu- 
ing. These vast conquests have been made by 
tlie courage, the energy, and the military power 
of Cyrus, Darius, and Canibyses, my renowned 
predecessors. They, on their part, have sub- 
dued Asia and Africa ; Europe remains. It 
devolves on me to finish what the}^ have begun. 
Had my father lived, he would, himself, have 
completed the work. He had already made 
great preparations for the undertaking ; but he 
died, leaving the task to me, and it is plain that 
1 cannot hesitate to undertake it without a 
manifest dereliction of duty. 

^' You all remember the unprovoked" and wan- 
ton aggressions which the Athenians com- 
mitted against us in the time of the Ionian re- 



THE DEBATE. 49 

bellion, taking part against us with rebels and 
enemies. They crossed the ^gean Sea on that 
occasion, invaded our territories, and at hist 
captured and burned the city of Sardis, the 
principal capital of our Western empire. I will 
never rest until I have had my revenge by burn- 
ing Athens. Many of you, too, who are here 
present, remember the fate of the expedition 
nnder Datis. Those of you who were attached 
to that expedition will have no need that I 
should urge you to seek revenge for your own 
wrongs. lam sure that you will all second my 
undertaking with the utmost fidelity and zeal. 
** My plan for gaining access to the Grecian 
territories is not, as before, to convey the troops 
by a fleet of galleys over the ^gean Sea, but 
to build a bridge across the Hellespont, and 
march the army to Greece by land. This 
course, which I am well convinced is practicable, 
will be more safe than the other, and the bridg- 
ing of the Hellespont will be of itself a glorious 
deed. The Greeks will be utterly unable to re- 
sist the enormous force which we shall be able 
to pour upon them. We cannot but conquer ; 
and inasmuch as beyond the Greek territories 
there is, as I am informed, no other power at 
all able to cope with us, we shall easily extend 
our empire on every side to the sea, and thus 
the Persian dominion will cover the whole hab- 
itable world. 



50 XERXES. 

'^ I am sure that T can rely on your cordial 
and faithful co-operation in these plans, and 
that each one of you will bring me, from his 
own province or territories, as large a quota of 
men, and of supplies for the war, as is in hi& 
power. They who contribute thus most liber- 
ally I shall consider as entitled to the highest 
honors and rewards.^' 

Such was, in substance, the address of Xerxes 
to his council. He concluded by saying that 
it was not his wish to act in the affair in an ar- 
bitrary or absolute manner, and he invited all 
present to express, with perfect freedom, any 
opinions or views which they entertained in 
respect to the enterprise. 

While Xerxes had been speaking, the soul of 
Mardonius had been on fire with excitement 
and enthusiasm, and every word which the king 
had uttered only fanned the flame. He rose 
immediately when the king gave permission to 
the counselors to speak, and earnestly seconded 
the monarch's proposals in the following words : 

*' For my part, sire, I cannot refrain from 
expressing my high admiration of the lofty spirit 
and purpose on your part, which leads you to 
propose to us an enterprise so worthy of your 
illustrious station and exalted personal renown. 
Your position and power at the present time 
are higher than those ever attained by any hu- 
man sovereign that has ever lived ; and it is 



THE DEJ3ATE. 51 

easy to foresee that tlierc is a career of glory 
before you which no future monarch can ever 
surpass. You are about to complete the con- 
quest of the world ! That exploit can, of course, 
never be exceeded. We all admire the proud 
spirit on your part which will not submit tame- 
ly to the aggressions and insults which we have 
received from the Greeks. We have con- 
qnered the people of India, of Egypt, of Ethi- 
opia, and of Assyria, and that, too, without 
having previously suffered any injury from 
them, but solely from a noble love of dominion ; 
and shall we tamely stop in our career when we 
see natiotis opposed to us from whom we have 
received so many insults, and endured so many 
wrongs ? Every consideration of honor and 
manliness forbids it. 

" We have nothing to fear in respect to the 
success of the enterprise in which you invite ns 
to engage. I know the Greeks, and I know 
that they cannot stand against our arms. I 
have encountered them many times and in va- 
rious ways. I met them in the provinces of 
Asia Minor, and you all know the result. I 
met them during the reign of Darius your 
father, in Macedon and Thrace — or, rather, 
sought to meet them ; for, though I marched 
through the country, the enemy always avoided 
me. They could not be found. They have 
a great name, it is true ; but, in fact, all their 



52 XERXES. 

plans and arrangements are governed by im- 
becility and folly. They are not even united 
among themselves. As thoy speak one com- 
mon language, any ordinary prudence and sa- 
gacity would lead them to combine together, 
and make common cause against the nations 
that surround them. Instead of this, they are 
divided into a multitude of petty states and 
kingdoms, and all their resources and power are 
exhausted in fruitless contentions with each 
other. I am convinced that, once across the 
Hellespont, w^e can march to Athens without 
finding any enemy to oppose our progress ; or, 
if we should encounter any resisting^ force, it 
will be so small and insignificant as to be in- 
stantly overwhelmed.^' 

In one point Mardonius was nearly right in 
his predictions, since it proved subsequently, as 
will hereafter be seen, that when the Persian 
army reached the pass of Thermopylae, which 
was the great avenue of entrance, on the north, 
into tlie territories of the Greeks, they found 
only three hundred men ready there to oppose 
their passage ! 

When Mardonius had concluded his speech, 
he sat down, and quite a solemn pause ensued. 
The nobles and chieftains generally were less 
ready than he to encounter the hazards and un- 
certainties of so distant a campaign. Xerxes 
would acquire, by the success of the enterprise. 



THE DEBATE. 53 

a great accession to his wealth and to his do- 
minion, and Mardonius, too, might expect to 
reap very rich rewards ; but what were they 
themselves to gain ? They did not dare, how- 
ever, to seem to oi:)2">ose the wishes of the king, 
and, notwithstanding the invitation which he 
had given them to speak, they remained silent, 
not knowing, in fact, exactly what to say. 

All this time Artabanus, the venerable uncle 
of Xerxes, sat silent like the rest, hesitating 
whether his years, his rank, and the relation 
which he sustained to the young monarch 
would justify his interposing, and make it pru- 
dent and safe for him to attempt to warn his 
nephew of the consequences which he would 
hazard by indulging his dangerous ambition. 
At length he determined to speak. 

'' I hope,^' said he, addressing the king, " that 
it will not displease you to have other views 
presented in addition to those wliich have al- 
ready been expressed. It is better that all 
opinions should be heard ; the just and the true 
will then appear the more just and true by com- 
parison with others. It seems to me that the 
enterprise which you contemj)late is full of dan- 
ger, and should be well considered before it is 
undertaken. When Darius, your father, con- 
ceived of the plan of his invasion of the country 
of the Scythians beyond the Danube, I coun- 
seled him against the attempt. The benefits 



54 XEEXES. 

to be secured by such an undertaking seemed 
to me wholly insufficient to compensate for the 
expense, the difficulties, and the dangers of it. 
My counsels were, however, overruled. Your 
father proceeded on the enterprise. He crossed 
the Bosporus, traversed Thrace, and then 
crossed the Danube ; but, after a long and weary 
contest with the hordes of savages which he 
found in those trackless wilds, he was forced to 
abandon the undertaking, and return, with the 
loss of half his army. The plan which you pro- 
pose seems to me to be liable to the same dan- 
gers, and I fear very much that it will lead to 
the same results. 

*^The Greeks have the name of being a val- 
iant and formidable foe. It may prove in the 
end that they are so. They certainly repulsed 
Datis and all his forces, vast as they were, and 
compelled them to retire with an enormous loss. 
Your invasion, I grant, will be more formidable 
than his. You will throw a bridge across the 
Hellespont, so as to take your troops round 
through the northern parts of Europe into 
Greece, and you will also, at the same time, 
have a powerful fleet in the ^gean Sea. But 
it must be remembered that the naval arma- 
ments of the Greeks in all those waters are 
very formidable. They may attack and destroy 
your fleet. Suppose that they should do so, 
and that then, proceeding to the northward in 



THE DEBATE. 55 

triumph, they should enter the Hellespont and 
destroy your bridge ? Your retreat would be 
cut off, and, in case of a reverse of fortune, your 
army would be exposed to total ruin. 

^' Your father, in fact, very narrowly escaped 
precisely this fate. The Scythians came to de- 
stroy his bridge across the Danube while his 
forces were still beyond the river, and, had it 
not been for the very extraordinary fidelity and 
zeal of Histiaeus, who had been left to guard 
the post, they would have succeeded in doing it. 
It is frightful to think that the whole Persian 
army, with the sovereign of the empire at their 
head, were placed in a position where their be- 
ins: saved from overwhelming and total destruc- 
tion depended solely on the fidelity and firm- 
ness of a single man ! Should you place your 
forces and your own person in the same danger, 
can you safely calculate upon the same fortunate 
escape ? 

" Even the very vastness of your force may 
be the means of insuring and accelerating its 
destruction, since whatever rises to extraordi- 
nary elevation and greatness is always exposed 
to dangers correspondingly extraordinary and 
great. Thus tall trees and lofty towers seem 
always specially to invite the thunderbolts of 
Heaven. 

'Olardonius charges the Greeks with a want 
of sagacity, efficiency, and valor, and speaks 



56 XERXES. 

contemptuously of them, as soldiers, in every 
respect. I do not think that such imputations 
are just to the people against whom they are 
directed, or honorable to him who makes them ; 
To disparage the absent, especially an absent 
enemy, is not magnanimous or wise ; and I 
very much fear that it will be found in the end 
that the conduct of the Greeks will evince very 
different military qualities from those which 
Mardonius has assigned them. They are rep- 
resented by common fame as sagacious, hardy, 
efficient, and brave, and it may prove that these 
representations are true. 

" My counsel therefore is that you dismiss 
this assembly, and take further time to consider 
this subject before coming to a final decision. 
Perhaps, on more mature reflection, you will 
conclude to abandon the project altogether. If 
you should not conclude to abandon it, but 
should decide, on the other hand, that it must 
be prosecuted, let me entreat you not to go 
yourself in company with the expedition. Let 
Mardonius take the charge and the responsibil- 
ity. If he does so, I predict that he will leave 
the dead bodies of the soldiers that you intrust 
to him, to be devoured by dogs on the plains 
of Athens or Lacedgemon.^^ 

Xerxes was exceedingly displeased at hearing 
such a speech as this from his uncle, and he 
made a very angry reply. He accused Arta- 



THE DEBATE. 57 

banus of meanness of spirit, and of a cowardice 
disgraceful to liis rank and station, in tlius ad- 
vocating a tame submission to the arrogant pre- 
tensions of tlie Greeks. Were it not, he said, 
for the respect which he felt for Artabanus, as 
his father's brother, he would punish him se- 
verely for his presumption in thus basely op- 
posing his sovereign's plans. '^ As it is," con- 
tinued he, ^'I will carry my plans into effect, 
but you shall not have the honor of accompa- 
nying me. You shall remain at Susa with tlie 
women and children of the palace, and spend 
your time in the effeminate and ignoble jileas- 
ures suited to a spirit so mean. As for myself, 
I must and will carry my designs into execu- 
tion. I could not, in fact, long avoid a contest 
with the Greeks, even if I were to adopt the 
cowardly and degrading policy which you rec- 
ommend ; for I am confident that they will very 
soon invade my dominions, if I do not antici- 
pate them by invading theirs." 

So saying, Xerxes dismissed the assembly. 

His mind, however, was not at ease. Though 
he had so indignantly rejected the counsel which 
Artabanus had offered him, yet the impressive 
words in v/hich it had been uttered, and the 
arguments with which it had been enforced, 
weighed upon his spirit, and oppressed and de- 
jected him. The longer he considered the sub- 
ject, the more serious his doubts and fears be- 



68 XERXES. 

came, until at length, as the night approached, 
he became convinced that Artabanus was 
right, and that he himself was wrong. His 
mind found no rest until he came to the deter- 
mination to abandon the project after all. He 
resolved to make this change in his resolution 
known to Artabanus and his nobles in the 
morning, and to countermand the orders which 
he had given for the assembling of the troops. 
Having by this decision restored something 
like repose to his agitated mind, he laid him- 
self down upon his couch and went to 
sleep. 

In the night he saw a vision. It seemed to 
him that a resplendent and beautiful form ap- 
peared before him, and after regarding him a 
moment with an earnest look, addressed him as 
follows : 

'' And do you really intend to abandon your 
deliberate design of leading an army into 
Greece, after having formally announced it to 
the realm and issued your orders ? Such fick- 
leness is absurd, and will greatly dishonor you. 
Eesume your plan, and go on boldly and perse- 
veringly to the execution of it." 

So saying, the vision disappeared. 

When Xerxes awoke in the morning, and the 
remembrance of the events of the preceding 
day returned, mingling itself with the new im- 
pressions which had been made by the dream, 



THE DEBATE. 69 

he was again agitated and perplexed. As, liow- 
ever, the various influences wliicli pressed upon 
him settled to their final equilibrium, tlie fears 
produced by Artabanus's substantial arguments 
and warnings on the preceding day proved to 
be of greater weight than the empty appeal to 
his pride which had been made by the phantom 
of the night. He resolved to persist in the 
abandonment of his scheme. He called his 
council, accordingly, together again, and told 
them that, on more mature reflection, he liad 
become convinced that his unole was riglit and 
that he himself had been wrong. The project, 
therefore, was for the present suspended, and 
the orders for the assembling of the forces were 
revoked. The announcement was received by 
the members of the council with the most tu- 
multuous joy. 

That night Xerxes had another dream. The 
same spirit appeared to him again, liis counte- 
nance, however, bearing uow, instead of the 
friendly look of the preceding night, a new and 
stern expression of displeasure. Pointing men- 
acingly at the frightened monarcli with his fin- 
ger, he exclaimed, ^'' You have rejected my ad- 
vice ; you have abandoned your plan ; and now 
I declare to you that, unless you immediately 
resume your enterprise and carry it forward to 
the eiul, sliort as has been the time since you 
were raised to your present elevation^ a still 

5 — Xcrxci 



60 XERXES. 

shorter period shall elapse before your downfall 
and destruction/^ 

The spirit then disappeared as suddenly as 
it came, leaving Xerxes to awake in an agony 
of terror. 

As soon as it was day, Xerxes sent for Arta- 
banus, and related to him his dreams. '' I was 
willing," said he, '' after hearing what you said, 
and maturely considering the subject, to give 
up my plan ; but these dreams, I cannot but 
think, are intimations from Heaven that I 
ought to proceed." 

Artabanus attempted to combat this idea by 
representing to Xerxes that dreams were not 
to be regarded as indications of the will of 
Heaven, but only as a vague and disordered 
reproduction of the waking thoughts, v/hile 
the regular action of the reason and the judg- 
ment by which they were ordinarily controlled 
was suspended or disturbed by the influence of 
slumber. Xerxes maintained, on the other 
hand, that, though this view of the case might 
explain his first vision, the solemn repetition of 
the warning proved that it was supernatural 
and divine. He proposed that, to put the re- 
ality of the apparition still further to the test, 
Artabanus should take his place on the royal 
couch the next night, to see if the specter 
would not appear to him. '^'^ You shall clothe 
yourself," said he, ^' in my robes, put the crown 



THE DEBATE. 61 

upon your head, and take your seat upon the 
throne. After that, you shall retire to my 
apartment, lie down upon the couch, and go to 
sleep. If the vision is supernatural, it will 
undouhtedly appear to you. If it does not so 
appear, I will admit that it was nothing but 
a dream 

Artabanus made some objection, at first, to 
the details of the arrangement which Xerxes 
proposed, as he did not see, he said, of what ad- 
vantage it could be for him to assume the guise 
and habiliments of the king. If the vision was 
divine, it could not be deceived by such artifices 
as those. Xerxes, however, insisted on his prop- 
osition, and Artabanus yielded. He assumed 
for an hour the dress and the station of the 
king, and then retired to the king^s apartment, 
and laid himself down upon the couch under 
the royal pavilion. As he had no faith in the 
reality of the vision, his mind was quiet an-d 
composed, and he soon fell asleep. 

At midnight, Xerxes, who was lying in an 
adjoining apartment, was suddenly aroused by 
a loud and piercing cry from the room where 
Artabanus was sleeping, and in a moment after- 
ward Artabanus himself rushed in, perfectly 
wild with terror. He had seen the vision. It 
had appeared before him with a countenance 
and gestures expressive of great displeasure, 
and after loading him with reproaches for hav- 



62 XERXES. 

ing attempted to keep Xerxes back from his 
proposed expedition into Greece, it attempted 
to bore out his eyes with a red-hot iron with 
which it was armed. Artabanus had barely 
succeeded in escaping by leaping from his couch 
and rushing precipitately out of the room.''' 

Artabanus said that he was now convinced 
and satisfied. It was i^lainly the divine will 
that Xerxes should undertake his projected in- 
vasion, and he would himself, thenceforth, aid 
the enterprise by every means in his power. 
The council was, accordingly, once more con- 
vened. The story of the three apparitions was 
related to them, and the final decision an- 
nounced that the armies were to be assembled 
for the march without any further delay. 

It is proper here to repeat, once for all in this 
volume, a remark which has elsewhere often 
been made in the various works of this series, 
that in studying ancient history at the present 
day, it is less important now to know, in regard 
to transactions so remote, what the facts act- 
ually were which really occurred, than it is to 
know the story respecting them, which, for the 
last two thousand years, has been in circulation 
among mankind. It is now, for example, of 
very little consequence whether there ever was 
or never was such a personage as Hercules ; but 



THE DEBATE. 



68 



it is essential that every educated man should 
know the story which ancient writers tell in 
relating his doings. In this view of the case, 
our object, in this volume, is sim])ly to give the 
history of Xerxes just as it stands, without stop- 
ping to separate the false from the true. In 
relating the occurrences, therefore, which have 
been described in this chapter, we simply give 
the alleged facts to our readers precisely as the 
ancient historians give them to us, leaving each 
reader to decide for himself how far he will be- 
lieve the narrative. In respect to this particu- 
lar story, we will add, that some people think 
that Mardonius was really the ghost by whose 
appearance Artabanus and Xerxes were so 
dreadfully frightened. 




Ancient Athens, 




OHAPTEE TV. 



PREPARATIONS FOR THE IJS^VASIOI^^ OF GREECE, 



As soon as the invasion of Greece was finally 
decided upon, the orders were transmitted to 
all the provinces of the empire, requiring the 
various authorities and powers to make the nec- 
essary preparations. There were men to be 
levied, arms to be manufactured, ships to be 
built, and stores of food to be provided. The 
expenditures, too, of so vast an armament as 
Xerxes was intending to organize, would re- 
quire a large supply of money. For all these 
things Xerxes relied on the revenues and the 
contributions of the provinces, and orders, very 
full and very imperative, w^ere transmitted, ac- 
cordingly, to all the governors and satraps of 
Asia, and especially to those who ruled over the 
countries which lay near the western confines of 
the empire, and consequently near the Greek 
frontiers. 

In modern times it is the practise of power- 
ful nations to accumulate arms and munition 
of war on storage in arsenals and naval depotS;^ 
64 



THE PREPARATIONS. 65 

SO that the necessary supplies for very extended 
operations, whether of attack or defense, can 
be procured in a very short period of time. In 
respect to funds, too, modern nations have a 
great advantauge over those of foimer days, in 
case of any sudden emergency arising to call for 
great and unusual expenditures. In conse- 
quence of the vast accumulation of capital in 
the hands of private individuals, and the con- 
fidence which is felt in the mercantile honor 
and good faith of most established governments 
at the present day, these governments can pro- 
cure indefinite supplies of gold and silver at any 
time, by promising to pay an annual interest in 
lieu of the principal borrowed. It is true that, 
in these cases, a stipulation is made, by which 
the government may, at a certain specified 
period, pay back the principal, and so extin- 
guish the annuity ; but in respect to a vast por- 
tion of the amount so borrowed, it is not ex- 
pected that this repayment will ever be made. 
The creditors, in fact, do not desire that it 
should be, as owners of property always prefer 
a safe annual income from it to the custody of 
the principal ; and thus governments in good 
credit have sometimes iiicuiced their creditors 
to abate the rate of interest which they were 
receiving, by threatening otherwise; to pay the 
debt in full. 

These inventions, however, by which a gov- 



66 X3RXES. 

eminent in one generation may enjoy the pleas- 
ure and reap the glory of waging war, and throw 
the burden of the expense on another, were 
not known in ancient times. Xerxes did not 
understand the art of funding a national debt, 
and there would, besides, have probably been 
very little confidence in Persian stocks, if any 
had been issued. He had to raise all his funds 
by actual taxation, and to have his arms, and 
his ships and chariots of war, manufactured ex- 
press. The food, too, to sustain the immense 
army which he was to raise, was all to be pro- 
duced, and store -houses were to be built for 
the accumulation and custody of it. All this, 
as might naturally be expected, would require 
time ; and the vastness of the scale on which 
these immense preparations were made is 
evinced by the fact that /o?^r years were the 
time allotted for completing them. This period 
includes, however, a considerable time before 
the great debate on the suDJect described in the 
last chapter. 

The chief scene of activity, during all this 
time, was the tract of country in the western 
part of Asia Minor, and aJong the shores of the 
^gean Sea. Taxes ana contributions were 
raised from all parts of the empire, but the 
actual material of war was furnished mainly 
from those provinces which were nearest to the 
future scene of it. Each district provided such 



THE PREPARATIONS. 67 

things as it naturally and most easily produced. 
One contributed horses, another arms and am- 
munition, another ships, and another provisions. 
The ships which were built were of various 
forms and modes of construction, according to 
the purposes which they were respectively in- 
tended to serve. Some were strictly ships of 
war, intended for actual combat ; others were 
transports, their destination being simply the 
conveyance of troops or of military stores. 
There were also a large number of vessels, which 
were built on a peculiar model, prescribed by 
the engineers, being very long and straight- 
sided, and smooth and flat upon their decks. 
These were intended for the bridge across the 
Hellespont. They were made long, so that, 
when placed side by side across the stream, a 
greater breadth might be given to the platform 
of the: bridge. All these things were very de- 
liberately and carefully planned. 

Although it was generally on tlie Asiatic side 
of the ^gean Sea that these vast works of prep- 
aration were going on, and the crossing of the 
Hellespont was to be the first great movement 
of the Persian army, the reader must not sup- 
pose that, even at this time, the European 
shores were wholly in the liands of tiie Greeks. 
The Persians had, long before, conquered 
Til race and a part of Macedon ; and thus the 
northern shores of the ^Egean Sea, and many 



68 XERXES. 

of the islands, were already in Xerxes's hands. 
The Greek dominions lay further south, and 
Xerxes did not anticipate any opposition from 
the enemy, until his army, after crossing the 
strait, should have advanced to the neighbor- 
hood of Athens. In fact, all the northern 
country through which his route would lie was 
already in his hands, and in passing through it 
he anticipated no difficulties except such as 
should arise from the elements themselves, and 
the physical obstacles of the way. The Helles- 
pont itself was, of course, one principal point 
of danger. The difficulty here was to be sur- 
mounted by the bridge of boats. There was, 
however, another point, whicii was, in some 
respects, still more formidable : it was the prom- 
ontory of Mount Athos. 

By looking at the map of Greece, placed at 
the commencement of the next chapter, the 
reader will see that there are two or three sin- 
gular promontories jutting out from the main 
land in the northwestern part of the ^gean 
Sea. The most northerly and the largest of 
these was formed by an immense mountainous 
mass rising out of the water, and connected by 
a narrow isthmus with the main land. The 
highest summit of this rocky pile was called 
Mount Athos in ancient times, and is so marked 
upon the map. In modern days it is called 
Monte Santo, or Holy iMountain, being covered 



THE PREPARATIONS. 



69 



with monasteries, and convents, and other ec- 
clesiastical establishments built in the Middle 



Ages. 



Mount Athos is very celebrated m ancient 
history. It extended along the promontory for 
many miles, and terminated abruptly in lofty 
cliffs and precipices toward the sea, where it 
was so high that its shadow, as was said, was 
thrown, at sunset, across the water to the is- 
land of Lemnos, a distance of twenty leagues. 
It was a frightful specter in the eyes of the an- 
cient navigators, when, as they came coasting 
along from the north in their frail galleys, on 
their voyages to Greece and Italy, they saw it 
frowning defiance to them as they came, with 
threatening clouds hanging npon its summit, 
and the surges and surf of the ^gean perpet- 
ually thundering upon its base below. ^ To 
make this stormy promontory the more terrible, 
it was believed to be the haunt of innumerable 
uncouth and misshapen monsters of the sea, 
that lived by devouring the hapless seamen 
who were thrown upon the rocks from then- 
wrecked vessels by the merciless tumult of the 

waves. , 

The plan which Xerxes had formed for the 
advance of his expedition was, that the army 
which was to cross the Hellespont by the bridge 
should advance thence through Macedonia and 
Thessaly, by land, attended by a squadron ot 



70 XERXES. 

ships, transports, and galleys, which was to ac- 
company the expedition along the coast by sea. 
The wen could be marched more conveniently 
to their place of destination by land. Tlie 
stores, on the other hand, the arms, the sup- 
plies, and the baggage of every description, 
could be transported more easily by sea. Mar- 
donius was somewhat solicitous in respect to 
the safety of the great squadron which would be 
required for this latter service, in doubling the 
promontory of Mount Athos. 

In fact, he had special and personal reason 
for his solicitude, for he had himself, some 
years before, met with a terrible disaster at this 
very spot. It was during the reign of Darius 
that this disaster occurred. On one of the ex- 
peditions which Darius had intrusted to his 
charge, he was conducting a very large fleet 
along the coast, when a sudden storm arose 
just as he was approaching this terrible prom- 
ontory. 

He was at the northern side of the promon- 
tory when the storm came on, and as the wind 
was from the north, it blew directly upon the 
shore. For the fleet to make its escape from 
the impending danger, it seemed necessary, 
therefore, to turn the course of the ships back 
against the wind ; but this, on account of the 
sudden and terrific violence of the gale, it was 
impossible to do. The sails, when they at- 



THE PREPARATIONS. '<'t 

tempted to use them, were blown away by the 
howling gusts, and the oars were broken to 
pieces by the tremendous dashing of the sea. 
It soon appeared that the only hope of escape 
for the squadron was to press on in the desper- 
ate attempt to double the promontory, and thus 
gain, if possible, the sheltered water under its 
lee. The galleys, accordingly, went on, the pi- 
lots and the seamen exerting their utmost to 
keep them aw^ay from the shore. 

All their efforts, however, to do this, were 
vain. The merciless gales drove the vessels, 
one after another, upon the rocks, and dashed 
them to pieces, while the raging sea wrenched 
the wretched mariners from the wrecks to 
which they attempted to cling, and tossed 
them out into the boiling wdiirlpools around, to 
the monsters that were ready there to devour 
them, as if she were herself some ferocious mon- 
ster, feeding her offspring with their proper prey. 
A few, it is true, of the hapless wretches suc- 
ceeded in extricating themselves from the surf, 
by crawling up upon the rocks, through the 
tangled sea- weed, until they were above the 
reach of the surges ; but when they had done 
so, they found themselves hopelessly imprisoned 
between the impending precipices which 
frowned above them and the frantic billows 
which were raging and roaring below^ They 
gained, of course, by their apparent escape, only 



72 XERXES. 

a brief prolongation of suffering, for they all 
soon miserably perished from exhaustion, ex- 
posure, and cold. 

Mardonius had no desire to encounter this 
danger again. Now the promontory of Mount 
Athos, though high and rocky itself, was con- 
nected with the main land by an isthmus level 
and low, and not very broad. Xerxes deter- 
mined on cutting a canal through this isthmus 
so as to take his fleet of galleys across the neck, 
and thus avoid the stormy navigation of the 
outward passage. Such a canal would be of 
service not merely for the passage of the great 
fleet, but for the constant communication which 
it would be neccessary for Xerxes to maintain 
with his own dominions during the whole period 
of the invasion. 

It might have been expected that the Greeks 
would have interfered to prevent the execution 
of such a work as this ; but it seems that they 
did not, and yet there was a considerable Greek 
population in that vicinity. The promontory 
of Athos itself was quite extensive, being about 
thirty miles long and four or five wide, and it 
had several towns upon it. The canal which 
Xerxes was to cut across the neck of this penin- 
sula was to be wide enough for two triremes 
to pass each other. Triremes were galleys pro- 
pelled by three banks of oars, and were vessels 
of the largest class ordinarily employed ; and as 



THE PREPARATIONS. 73 

the oars by which they were impelled required 
almost as great a breadth of water as the ves- 
sels themselves, the canal was consequently, to 
be very wide. 

The engineers, accordingly, laid out the 
ground, and, marking the boundaries by stakes 
and lines, as guides to the workmen, the exca- 
vation was commenced. Immense numbers of 
men were set at work, arranged regularly in 
gangs, according to the various nations which 
furnished them. As the excavation gradually 
proceeded, and the trench began to grow deep, 
they placed ladders against the sides, and sta- 
tioned a series of men upon them ; then the 
earth dug from the bottom was hauled up from 
one to another, in a sort of basket or hod, un- 
til it reached the top, where it was taken by 
other men and conveyed away. 

The work was very much interrupted and 
impeded, in many parts of the line, by the con- 
tinual caving in of the banks, on account of 
the workmen attempting to dig perpendicu- 
larly down. In one section — the one which 
had been assigned to the Phoenicians — this diffi- 
culty did not occur ; for the Phoenicians, more 
considerate than the rest had taken the precau- 
tion to make the breadth of their part of the 
trench twice as great at the top as it was below. 
By this means the banks on each side were 
formed to a gradual slope, and consequently 

O— Xerxea 



T4 XERXES. 

stood firm. The canal was at length completed, 
and the water was let in. 

North of the promontory of Mount Athos the 
reader will find upon the map the River Stry- 
mon, flowing south, not far from the boundary 
between Macedon and Thrace, into the ^gean 
Sea. The army of Xerxes, in its march from 
the Hellespont, would, of course, have to cross 
this river ; and Xerxes having, by cutting the 
canal across the isthmus of Mount Athos, re- 
moved an obstacle in the way of his fleet, re- 
solved next to facilitate the progress of his 
army by bridging the Strymon. 

The king also ordered a great number of 
granaries and store-houses to be built at various 
points along the route which it was intended 
that his army should pursue. Some of these 
were on the coasts of Macedonia and Thrace, 
and some on the banks of the Strymon. To 
these magazines the corn raised in Asia for the 
use of the expedition was conveyed, from time 
to time, in transport ships, as fast as it was 
ready, and, being safely deposited, was protect- 
ed by a guard. No very extraordinary means 
of defense seems to have been thought neces- 
sary at these points, for, although \he scene of 
all these preliminary arrangements was on the 
European side of the line, and in what was 
called Greek territory, still this part of the 
country had been long under Persian do- 



THE PREPARATIONS. 75 

minion. The inde))ondent states and cities 
of Greece were all further soiitli, and tlie people 
who inliabited them did not seem disposed to 
interrupt tliese preparations. Perliaps they 
were not aware to what object and end all these 
formidable movements on their northern frontier 
were tending. 

Xerxes, during all this time, liad remained 
in Persia. The period at length arrived when, 
his preparations on the frontiers being far ad- 
vanced toward completion, he concluded to 
move forward at the head of his forces to Sar- 
dis. Sardis was the great capital of the west- 
ern part of his dominions, and was situated 
not far from the frontier. He accordingly as- 
sembled his forces, and, taivin^ leave of his 
capital of Susa with much -psLrade and many 
ceremonies. Ire advanced toward Asia ]\Iinor. 
Entering and traversing Asia Minor, he crossed 
the Halys, which had been in former times, the 
western boundary of the empire, though its 
limits had now been extended very far beyond. 
Having crossed the Halys, the immense jiro- 
cession advanced into Phrygia. 

A very romantic tale is told of an interview 
between Xerxes and a certain nobleman named 
Py thins, who resided in one of the Phrygian 
towns. The circumstances were these : After 
crossing the Halys, which river flows north into 
the Euxine Sea, the army went on to the west- 



76 XERXES, 

■ward through nearly the whole extent of Phry- 
gia, until at length they came to the sources of 
the streams which flowed west into the ^gean 
Sea. One of the most remarkable of these riv- 
ers was the Meander. There was a town built 
exactly at the source of the Meander — so ex- 
actly, in fact, that the fountain from which the 
stream took its rise was situated in the public 
square of the town, walled in and ornamented 
like an artificial fountain in a modern city. 
The ntime of this town was Celeenae. 

When the army reached Cela3nas and en- 
camped there, Pythius made a great entertain- 
ment for the officers, Avhich, as the number was 
very large, was of course attended with an enor- 
mous expense. Not satisfied with this, Pyth- 
ius sent word to the king that if he was, in any 
respect, in want of funds for his approaching 
campaign, he, Pythius, would take great pleas- 
ure in supplying him. 

Xerxes was surprised at such proofs of wealth 
and munificence from a man in comparatively 
a private station. He inquired of his attend- 
ants who Pythius was. They replied that, next 
to Xerxes himself, he was the richest man in 
the world. They said, moreover, that he was 
as generous as he was rich. He had made Da- 
rius a present of a beautiful model of a fruit- 
tree and of a vine, of solid gold. He was by 
birth, they added, a Lydian. 



THE PREPARATIONS. 77 

Lydia was west of Phrygia, and was famous 
for its wealth. The River Pactohis, which was 
so celebrated for its golden sands, flowed 
through the country, and as the i^rinces and 
nobles contrived to monopolize the treasures 
which were found, both in the river itself and 
in the mountain from which it flowed, some of 
them became immensely wealthy. 

Xerxes was astonished at the accounts which 
he heard of Pythius's fortune. He sent for him, 
and asked him what was the amount of his 
treasures. This was rather an ominous ques- 
tion ; for, under such des2:)otic governments as 
those of the Persian kings, the only real safe- 
guard of wealth was, often, the concealment of 
it. Inquiry on the part of a goverment, in re- 
spect to treasures accumulated by a subject, 
was, often, only a preliminary to the seizure 
and confiscation of them. 

Pythius, however, in reply to the king's ques- 
tion, said that he had no hesitation in giving 
his majesty full information in respect to his 
fortune. He had been making, he said, a care- 
ful calculation of the amount of it, with a view 
of determining how much he could offer to con- 
tribute in aid of the Persian campaign. He 
found, he said, that he had two thousand tal- 
ents of silver, and four millions, wanting seven 
thousand, of staters of gold. 

The stater was a Persian coin. Even if we 



78 xfiRXfig. 

knew, at the present day, its exact value, we 
could not determine the precise amount denot- 
ed by the sum which Pythius named, the value 
of money being subject to such vast fluctua- 
tions in different ages of the world. Scholars 
who have taken an interest in inquiring into 
such points as these, have come to the conclu- 
sion that the amount of gold and silver coin 
which Pythius thus reported to Xerxes was 
equal to about thirty millions of dollars. 

Pythius added, after stating the amount of 
the gold and silver which he had at command, 
that it was all at the service of the king for the 
purpose of carrying on the war. He had, he 
said, besides his money, slaves and farms enough 
for his own maintenance. 

Xerxes was extremely gratified at this gener- 
osity, and at the proof which it afforded of the 
interest which Pythius felt in the cause of the 
king. ^^ You are the only man,'^ said he, 
" who has offered hospitality to me or to my 
army since I set out upon this march, and, in 
addition to your hospitality, you tender me 
your whole fortune. 1 will not, however, de- 
prive you of your treasure. I will, on the con- 
trary, order my treasurer to pay to you the seven 
thousand staters necessary to make your four 
millions complete. I offer you also my friend- 
ship, and will do anything in my power, now 
and hereafter, to serve you. Continue to live 



THE PREPARATIONS. 79 

in the enjoyment of your fortune. If you al- 
ways act under, the influence of the noble and 
generous impulses which govern you now, you 
will never cease to be prosperous and happy." 
If we could end the account of Pythius and 
Xerxes here, what generous and noble-minded 
men Ave might suppose them to be ! But alas ! 
how large a portion of the apparent generosity 
and nobleness which shows itself among poten- 
tates and kings, turns into selfishness and hy- 
pocrisy when closely examined. Pythius was 
one of the most merciless tyrants that ever 
lived. He held all the people that lived upon 
his vast estates in a condition of abject slavery, 
compelling them to toil continually in his mines, 
in destitution and wretchedness, in order to add 
more and more to his treasures. The people 
came to his wife with their bitter complaints. 
She pitied them, but could not relieve them. 
One day, it is said that, in order to show her 
husband the vanity and folly of living only to 
amass silver and gold, and to convince him how 
little real power such treasures have to satisfy 
the wants of the human soul, she made him a 
great entertainment, in wliicli* there was a 
boundless profusion of wealtli in the way of ves- 
sels and furniture of silver and gold, but scarce- 
ly any food. There was everything to satisfy 
the eye with the sight of magnificence, but 
nothing to satisfy hunger. The noble guest sat 



80 XERXES. 

starving in the midst of a scene of unexampled 
riches and splendor, because it was not possible 
to eat silver and gold. 

And as for Xerxes's professions of gratitude 
and friendship for Pythius, they were put to 
the test, a short time after the transactions 
which we have above described, in a remark- 
able manner. Pythius had five sons. They 
were all in Xerxes's army. By their departure 
on the distant and dangerous expedition on 
which Xerxes was to lead them, their father 
Avould be left alone. Pythius, under these cir- 
cumstances, resolved to venture so far on the 
sincerity of his sovereign's professions of regard 
as to request permission to retain one of his 
sor,s at home with his father, on condition of 
freely giving up the rest. 

Xerxes, on hearing this proposal, was greatly 
enraged. ^^ How dare you," said he, ^' come 
to me with such a demand ? You and all that 
pertain to you are my slaves, and are bound to 
do my bidding without a murmur. You de- 
serve the severest punishment for such an in- 
solent request. In consideration, however, of 
your past good behavior, I will not inflict upon 
you what you deserve. I will only kill one of 
your sons — the one that you seem to cling to 
so fondly. I will spare the rest.'' So saying, 
the enraged king ordered the son whom Py thins 
had endeavored to retain to be slain before his 



THE PREPARATIONS. 81 

eyes, and then directed that the dead body 
should be sj^lit in two, and the two halves 
thrown, the one on the right side of the road 
and the other on the left, that his army, as he 
said, might " march between them/'' 

On leaving Phrygia, the army moved on 
to\vard the west. Their immediate destina- 
tion, as has already been said, was Sardis, 
where they were to remain nntil the ensuing 
spring. The historian mentions a number of 
objects of interest which attracted the atten- 
tion of Xerxes and his officers on this march, 
wdiich mark the geographical peculiarities oi 
the country, or illustrate, in some degree, the 
ideas and manners of the times. 

There was one town, for example, situated, 
not like Celjenae, where a river had its origin, 
but where one disappeared. The stream was a 
branch of the Meander. It came down from 
the mountains like any other mountain tor- 
rent, and then, at the town in question, it 
i:)lunged suddenly down into a gulf or chasm 
and disappeared. It rose again at a consider- 
able distance below, and thence flowed on, 
without any further evasions, to the Meander. 

On the confines between Phrygia and Lydia 
the army came to a place where the road di- 
vided. One branch tuimed toward the north, 
and led to Lydia ; the other inclined to the 
south, and conducted to Caria. Here, too, on 



82 XERXES. 

the frontier, was a monument wliicli had been 
erected by Croesus, the great king of Lydia, 
who lived in Cyrus's day, to mark the eastern 
boundaries of his kir.gdom. The Persians 
were, of course, much interested in looking 
upon this ancient landmark, which designated 
not only the eastern limit of Croesus's empire, 
but also what was, in ancient times, the west- 
ern limit of their own. 

There was a certain species of tree which 
grew in these countries called the plane-tree. 
Xerxes found one of these trees so large and 
beautiful that it attracted his special admira- 
tion. He took possession of it in his own name, 
and adorned it with golden chains, and set a 
guard over it. This idolization of a tree was a 
striking instance of the childish caprice and 
folly by which the actions of the ancient des- 
pots were so often governed. 

As the army advanced, they came to other 
places of interest and objects of curiosity and 
wonder. There was a district where the people 
made a sort of artificial honey from grain, and 
a lake from which the inhabitants procured salt 
by evaporation, and mines, too, of silver and 
of gold. These objects interested and amused 
the minds of the Persians as they moved along, 
without, however, at all retarding or interrupt- 
ing their progress. In due time they reached 
the great city of Sardis in safety, and here 



THE PREPARATIONS. 



83 



Xerxes established liis iieadquarters, and 
awaited the coming of spring. 

In the mean time, however, he sent lieralds 
into Greece to summon the country to surren- 
der to him. This is a common formality when 
an army is about to attack either a town, a 
castle, or a kingdom. Xerxes's heralds crossed 
the ^Egean Sea, and made their demands, in 
Xerxes's name, upon the Greek authorities. 
As might have been expected, the embassage 
was fruitless ; and the heralds returned, bring- 
ing with them, from the Greeks, not acts or 
proffers of submission, but stern expressions of 
hostility and defiance. Xothing, of course, now 
remained, but that both parties should prej^are 
for the impending crisis. 





CHAPTER V. 



CliOSSII^G THE HELLESPONT. 



Although the ancient Asia Minor was in 
the same latitude as New York, there was yet 
very little winter there. Snows fell, indeed, 
upon the summits of the mountains, and ice 
formed occasionally upon quiet streams, and 
yet, in general, the imaginations of the inhabi- 
tants, in forming mental images of frost and 
snow, sought them not in their own winters, 
but in the cold and icy regions of the north, of 
which, however, scarcely anything was known 
to them except what was disclosed by wild and 
exaggerated rumors and legends. 

There was, however, a period of blustering 
winds and chilly rains which was called winter, 
and Xerxes was compelled to wait, before com- 
mencing his invasion, until the inclement sea- 
son had passed. As it was, he did not wholly 
escape the disastrous effects of the wintery 
gales. A violent storm arose while he was at 
Sardis, and broke up tlie brid.o-e which he had 

built across the Hellespont. When the tidings 

84 



CROSSING THE HELLESPONT. 85 

of this disaster were brouglit to Xerxes at his 
winter quarters, he was very much enraged. 
He was angry both with the sea for having de- 
stroyed the structure, and with the architects 
who had built it for not having made it strong 
enough to stand against its fury. He deter- 
mined to punish both the waves and the work- 
men. He ordered the sea to be scourged with 
a monstrous whip, and directed that heavy 
chains should be thrown into it, as symbols of 
his defiance of its power, and of his determina- 
tion to subject it to his control. The men who 
administered this senseless discipline cried out 
to the sea, as they did it, in the following words, 
which Xerxes ha-d dictated to them : " Miser- 
able monster ! this is the jDunishment which 
Xerxes your master inflicts upon you, on ac- 
count of the unprovoked and wanton injury you 
have done him. Be assured that he will pass 
over you, whether you will or no. He hates 
and defies you, object as you are, through your 
insatiable cruelty, and the nauseous bitterness 
of your waters, of the common abomination of 
mankind." 

As for the men who had built the bridge, 
which had been found thus inadequate to with- 
stand the force of a wintery tempest, he or- 
dered every one of them to be beheaded. 

The vengeance of the king being thus satis- 
fied, a new set of engineers and workmen Avere 



86 XERXES. 

designated and ordered to build another bridge. 
Knowing, as, of course, they now did, that their 
lives depended upon the stability of their struc- 
ture, they omitted no possible precaution which 
could tend to secure it. They selected the 
strongest ships, and arranged them in positions 
which would best enable them to withstand the 
pressure of the current. Each vessel was se- 
cured in its place by strong anchors, placed sci- 
entifically in such a manner as to resist, to the 
best advantage, the force of the strain to which 
they would be exposed. There were two ranges 
of these vessels, extending from shore to shore, 
containing over three hundred in each. In each 
range one or two vessels were omitted, on the 
Asiatic side, to allow boats and galleys to pass 
through, in order to keep the communication 
open. These omissions did not interfere with 
the use of the bridge, as the superstructure and 
the roadway above was continued over them. 

The vessels which were to serve for the foun- 
dation of the bridge being thus arranged and 
secured in their places, two immense cables 
were made and stretched from shore to shore^ 
each being fastened, at the ends, securely to the 
banks, and resting in the middle of the decks 
of the vessels. For the fastenings of these ca- 
bles on the shore there were immense piles driv- 
en into the ground, and huge rings attached to 
the piles. The cables, as they passed along the 



CROSSING THE HELLESPONT. 87 

decks of the voxels over the water, were secured 
to them all by strong cordage, so that each vessel 
was firmly and indissolubly bound to all the 
rest. 

Over these cables a platform was made of 
trunks of trees, with branches phiced upon 
them to fill the interstices and level the sur- 
face. The whole was then covered with a 
thick stratum of earth, which made a firm and 
substantial road like that of a public highway. 
A high and close fence was also erected on eacli 
side, so as to shut off the view of the water, 
which might otherwise alarm the horses and 
the beasts of burden that were to cross with 
the army. 

When the news was brought to Xerxes at 
Sardis that the bridge was completed, and that 
all things were ready for the passage, he made 
arrangements for commencing his march. A 
circumstance, however, here occurred that at 
first alarmed him. It was no less a phenome- 
non than an eclipse of the sun. Eclipses were 
considered in those days as extraordinary and 
supernatural omens, and Xerxes was naturally 
anxious to know what this sudden darkness 
was meant to portend. He directed the magi 
to consider the subject, and to give him their 
opinion. Their answer was, that, as the sun 
was the guardian divinity of the Greeks, and 
the moon that of the Persians, the meaning of 

7 — Xerxes 



88 XERXES. 

the sudden withdrawal of the light of day 
doubtless was, that Heaven was about to with- 
hold its protection from the Greeks in the 
approaching struggle. Xerxes Vv^as satisfied 
with this explanation, and the preparations for 
the march went on. 

The movement of the grand procession from 
the city of Sardis was inconceivably splendid. 
First came the long trains of baggage, on 
mules, and camels, and horses, and other beasts 
of burden, attended by the drivers, and the 
men who had the baggage in charge. Next 
came an immense body of troops of all nations, 
marching irregularly, bat under the command 
of the proper officers. Then, after a consider- 
able interval, came a body of a thousand horse, 
splendidly caparisoned, and followed by a 
thousand spearmen, who marched trailing 
their spears upon the ground, in token of re- 
spect and submission to the king who was 
coming behind them. 

Next to these troops, and immediately in ad- 
vance of the king, were certain religious and 
sacred objects and personages, on which the 
^ people who gazed upon this gorgeous spectacle 
looked with the utmost awe and veneration. 
There were, first, ten sacred horses, splendidly 
caparisoned, each led by his groom, who was 
clothed in appropriate robes, as a sort of priest 
officiating in the service of a god. Behind 



CROSSING THE HELLESPONT. 89 

these came the sacred car of Jupiter. This 
car was very large, and elaborately worked, and 
was profusely ornamented with gold. It was 
drawn by eight white horses. No human being 
was allowed to set his foot upon any part of it, 
and, consequently, the reins of the horses were 
carried back, under the car, to the charioteer, 
who walked behind. Xerxes's own chariot 
came next, drawn by very splendid horses, 
selected especially for their size and beauty. 
His charioteer, a young Persian noble, sat by 
his side. 

Then came great bodies of troops. There 
was one corps of two thousand men, the life- 
guards of the king, who were armed in a very 
splendid and costly manner, to designate their 
high rank in the army, and the exalted nature 
of their duty as personal attendants on the sov- 
ereign. One thousand of these life-guards 
were foot soldiers, and the other thousand 
horsemen. After the life-guards came a body 
of ten thousand infantry, and after them ten 
thousand cavalry. This completed what was 
strictly the Persian part of the army. There 
was an interval of about a quarter c^f a mile in 
the rear of these bodies of troops, and then 
came a vast and countless multitude of servants, 
attendants, adventurers, and camp followers 
of every description — a confused, promiscuous, 
disorderly, and noisy throng. 



90 XERXES. 

The immediate destination of this vast 
horde was Abydos ; for it was between Sestos, 
on the European shore, and Abydos, on the 
Asiatic, that the bridge had been built. To 
reach Abydos, the route was north, through 
the province of Mysia. In their progress the 
guides of the army kept well inland, so as to 
avoid the indentations of the coast, and the 
various small rivers which here flow westward 
toward the sea. Thus advancing, the army 
passed to the right of Mount Ida, and arrived 
at last on the bank of the Scamander. Here 
they encamped. They were upon the plain 
of Troy. 

The world was filled, in those days, with 
the glory of the military exploits which had 
been performed, some ages before, in the siege 
and capture of Troy ; and it was the custom 
for every military hero who passed the site of 
the city to pause in his march and spend some 
time amid the scenes of those ancient conflicts, 
that he might inspirit and invigorate his own 
ambition by the associations of the spot, and 
also render suitable honors to the memories of 
those that fell there. Xerxes did this. Alex- 
ander subsequently did it. Xerxes examined 
the various localities, ascended the ruins of 
tne citadel of Priam, walked over the ancient 
battle-fields, and at length, when his curiosity 
had thus been satisfied, he ordered a grand 



CROSSING THE HELLESPONT. 91 

sacrifice of a thousand oxen to be made, and a 

libatioji of corresponding magnitude to be of- 
fered, in honor of the shades of the dead heroes 
whose deeds had consecrated the spot. 

Whatever excitement and exhilaration, how- 
ever, Xerxes himself may have felt, in approach- 
ing, under these circumstances, the transit of 
the stream, where the real labors and dangers 
of his expedition were to commence, his miser- 
able and helpless soldiers did not share them. 
Their condition and prospects were wretched in 
the extreme. In the first place, none of them 
went willingly. In modern times, at least in 
England and America, armies are recruited by 
enticing the depraved and the miserable to en- 
list, by tendering them a bounty, as it is called, 
that is, a sum of ready money, which, as a means 
of temporary and often vicious pleasure, jire- 
sents a temptation they cannot resist. The act 
of enlistment is, however, in a sense voluntary, 
so that those who have homes, and friends, and 
useful pursuits in which they are i:)eacefully 
engaged, are not disturbed. It was not so 
with the soldiers of Xerxes. They were slaves, 
and had been torn from their rural homes all 
over the empire by a merciless conscription, 
from which there was no possible escape. 
Their life in camp, too, was comfortless and 
wretched. At the present day, when it is so 
much more difficult than it tlien was to obtain 



92 XERXES. 

soldiers^ and when so mncli more time and at- 
tention are required to train them to their work 
in the modern art of war, soldiers must be taken 
care of when obtained ; but in Xerxes^s day it 
was much easier to get new supplies of recruits 
than to incur any great expense in providing 
for the health and comfort of those already in 
the service. The arms and trappings, it is true, 
of such troops as were in immediate attendance 
on the king, were very splendid and gay, though 
this was only decoration after all, and the 
king's decoration too, not theirs. In respect, 
however, to everything like personal comfort, 
whether of food and of clothing, or the means 
of shelter and repose, the common soldiers were 
utterly destitute and wretched. They felt no 
interest in the campaign ; they had nothing to 
hope for from its success, but a continuance, if 
their lives were spared, of the same miserable 
bondage which they had always endured. 
There was, however, little probability even of 
this ; for whether, in the case of such an in- 
vasion, the aggressor was to succeed or to fail, 
the destiny of the soldiers personally was almost 
inevitable destruction. The mass of Xerxes's 
army was thus a mere herd of slaves, driven 
along by the whips of their officers, reluctant, 
wretched, and despairing. 

This helpless mass was overtaken one night, 
among the gloomy and rugged defiles and passes 



CKOSSING THE HELLESPONT. 93 

of Mount Ida, by a dreadful storm of wind and 
rain, accompanied by thunder and lightning. 
Unprovided as they were with the means of pro- 
tection against such tempests, they were thrown 
into confusion, and spent the night in terror. 
Great numbers perished, struck by the light- 
ning, or exhausted by the cold and exposure ; 
and afterward, when they encamped on the 
plains of Troy, near tlie Scamander, the whole 
of the water of the stream was not enough to 
supply the wants of the soldiers and the immense 
herds of beasts of burden, so that many thou- 
sands suffered severely from thirst. 

All these things conspired greatly to depress 
the spirits of the men, so that at last, when 
they arrived in the vicinity of Abydos, the 
whole army was in a state of extreme dejection 
and despair. This, however, was of little con- 
sequence. The repose of a master so despotic 
and lofty as Xerxes is very little disturbed by 
the mental sorrows of his slaves. Xerxes 
reached Abydos, and prepared to make the 
passage of the strait in a manner worthy of the 
grandeur of the occasion. 

The first thing was to make arrangements 
for a great parade of his forces, not, apparently, 
for the purpose of accomplishing any useful end 
of military organization in the arrangement of 
the troops, but to gratify the pride and pleasure 
of the sovereign with an opportunity of survey- 



/ 



94 XERXES. 

ing them. A great white throne of marble was 
accordingly erected on an eminence not far 
from the shore of the Hellespont, from which 
Xerxes looked down with great complacency 
and pleasure, on the one hand, upon the long 
lines of troops, the countless squadrons of horse- 
men, the ranges of tents, and the vast herds of 
beasts of burden which were assembled on the 
land, and, on the other hand, upon the fleets of 
ships, and boats, and galleys at anchor upon 
the sea ; while the shores of Europe were smil- 
ing in the distance, and the long and magnifi- 
cent roadway which he had made lay floating 
upon the water, all ready to take his enormous 
armament across whenever he should issue the 
command. 

Any deep emotion of the human soul, in per- 
sons of a sensitive physical organization, tends 
to tears ; and Xerxes's heart, being filled with 
exultation and pride, and with a sense of inex- 
pressible grandeur and sublimity as he looked 
upon this scene, was softened by the pleasura- 
ble excitements of the hour, and though, at first- 
his countenance was beaming with satisfaction 
and pleasure, his uncle Artabanus, who stood 
by his side, soon perceived that tears were 
standing in his eyes. Artabanus asked him 
what this meant. It made him sad, Xerxes 
rej^lied, to reflect that, immensely vast as the 
countless multitude before him was, in one 



CROSSING THE HELLESPONT. 95 

hundred years from that time not one of them 
all would be alive. 

The tender-heartedness which Xerxes mani- 
fested on this occasion, taken in connection with 
the stern and unrelenting tyranny which he was 
exercising over tlie mighty mass of humanity 
whose mortality he mourned, has drawn forth 
a great variety of comments from writers of 
every age who have repeated the story. Artaba- 
nus replied to it on the spot by saying that he 
did not think that the king ought to give him- 
self too much uneasiness on the subject of hu- 
man liability to death, for it haj)pened, in a vast 
number of cases, that the privations and suffer- 
ings of men were so great, that often, in the 
course of their lives, they rather wished to die 
than to live ; and that death was, consequently, 
in some respects, to be regarded, not as in it- 
self a wo, but rather as the relief and remedy 
for wo. 

There is no doubt that this theory of Arta- 
banus, so far as it applied to the unhappy sol- 
diers of Xerxes, all marshaled before him when 
he uttered it, was eminently true. 

Xerxes admitted that what his uncle said was 
just, but it was, he said, a melancholy subject, 
and so he changed the conversation. He asked 
his uncle whether he still entertained the same 
doubts and fears in respect to the expedition 
that he had expressed at Susa when the plan 



96 XERXES. 

was first proposed in the council. Artabanns 
replied that he most sincerely hoped that the 
prognostications of the vision would prove true, 
but that he had still great apprehensions of the 
result. ^' I have been reflecting," continued 
he, '' with great care on the whole subject, and 
it seems to me that there are two dangers of very 
serious character to which your expedition will 
be imminently exposed.''^ 

Xerxes wished to know what they were. 

'^ They both arise," said Artabanus, '^' from 
the immense magnitude of your operations. In 
the first place, you have so large a number of 
ships, galleys, and transports in your fleet, that 
I do not see how, when you have gone down 
upon the Greek coast, if a storm should arise, 
you are going to find shelter for them. There 
are no harbors there large enough to afford an- 
chorage ground for such an immense number 
of vessels." 

" And what is the other danger ? " asked 
Xerxes. 

'' The other is the difficulty of finding food 
for such a vast multitude of men as you have 
brought together in your armies. The quan- 
tity of food necessary to supply such countless 
numbers is almost incalculable. Your grana- 
ries and magazines will soon be exhausted, and 
then, as no country whatever that you can pass 
through wiil have resources of food adequate 



CnOSSTNG THE HELLESPONT. 97 

for such a multitude of mouths, it seems to me 
that your march must enevitably end in a fam- 
ine. The less resistance you meet with, and 
the further you consequently advance, the worse 
it will he for you. I do not see how this fatal 
result can possibly be avoided ; and so uneasy 
and anxious am I on the subject, that I have no 
rest or peace." 

" I admit,'' said Xerxes, in reply, " that what 
you say is not wholly -unreasonable ; but in 
great undertakings it will never do to take 
counsel wholly of our fears. I am willing to 
submit to a very large portion of the evils to 
which I expose myself on this expedition, rather 
than not accomplish the end which I have in 
view. Besides, the most prudent and cautious 
counsels iire not always the best. He who haz- 
ards nothing gains nothing. I have always ob- 
served that in all the aifairs of human life, those 
who exhibit some enterprise and courage in 
what they undertake are far more likely to be 
successful than those who weigh everything 
and consider everything, and will not advance 
where they can see any remote prospect of dan- 
ger. If my predecessors had acted on the prin- 
ciples which you recommend, the Persian em- 
pire Avould never have acquired the greatness 
to which it has now attained. In continuing 
to act on the same principles which governed 
them, I confidently expect the same success. 



98 XERXES. 

"We shall conquer Europe, and then return in 
peace, I feel assured, without encountering the 
famine which you dread so much, or any other 
great calamity/^ 

On hearing these words, and observing how 
fixed and settled the determinations of Xerxes 
were, Artabanus said no more on the general 
subject, but on one point he ventured to offer 
his counsel to his nephew, and that was on the 
subject of employing, the lonians in the war. 

The lonians were Greeks by descent. Their 
ancestors had crossed the ^gean Sea, and set- 
tled at various places along the coast of Asia 
Minor, in the western part of the provinces of 
Caria, Lydia, and Nysia. Artabanus thought 
it was dangerous to take these men to fight 
against their countrymen. However faithfully 
disposed they might be in commencing the en- 
terprise, a thousand circumstances might occur 
to shake their fidelity and lead them to revolt, 
when they found themselves in the land of their 
forefathers, and heard the enemies against 
whom they had been brought to contend speak' 
ing their owm mother tongue. 

Xerxes, however, was not convinced by Ar- 
tabanus's arguments. He thought that the 
employment of the lonians was perfectly safe. 
They had been eminently faithful and firm, he 
said, under Histiseus, in the time of Darius^y 
invasion of Scythia, when Darius had left them 



CROSSING THE HELLESPONT. 09 

to guard his bridge over the Danube. They 
had proven themselves trustworthy then, and 
lie would, he said, accordingly trust tliem now. 
" Besides," he added, -- they have left their 
property, their wives and their children, and 
all else that they hold dear, in our hands in 
Asia, and they will not dare, while we retain 
such hostages, to do anything against us." 

Xerxes said, however, that since Artabanus 
was so much concerned in respect to the result 
of the expedition, he should not be compelled 
to accompany it any further, but tliat he might 
return to Susa instead, and take charge of the 
government there until Xerxes should return. 

A part of the celebration on the great day of 
parade, on which this conversation between the 
king and his uncle was held, consisted of a na- 
val sea fight, waged on the Hellespont, between 
two of the nations of his army, for the king's 
amusement. The Phoenicians were the victors 
in this combat. Xerxes was greatly delighted 
with the combat, and, in fact, with tlie whole 
of the magnificent spectacle which the day had 
displayed. 

Soon after this, Xerxes dismissed Artabanus, 
ordering him to return to Susa, and to assume 
the regency of the empire. lie convened, also, 
another general council of the nobles of his 
court and the officers of tliearmy, to annouiice 
to them that the time had arrived for crossing 
LiTC. 



100 XERXES. 

the bridge, and to make his farewell address to 
them before they should take their final depart- 
ure from Asia. He exhorted them to enter 
upon the great work before them with a de- 
termined and resolute spirit, saying that if the 
Greeks were once subdued, no other enemies 
able at all to cope with the Persians would be 
left on the habitable globe. 

On the dismission of the council, orders were 
given to commence the crossing of the bridge 
the next day at sunrise. The preparations 
were made accordingly. In the morning, as 
soon as it was light, and while waiting for the 
rising of the sun, they burned upon the bridge 
all manner of perfumes, and strewed the way 
with branches of myrtle, the emblem of triumph 
and joy. As the time for the rising of the sun 
drew nigh, Xerxes stood with a golden vessel 
full of wine, which he was to pour out as a li- 
bation as soon as the first dazzling beams should 
appear above the horizon. When, at length, 
the moment arrived, he poured out the wine 
into the sea, throwing the vessel in which it had 
been contained after it as an offering. He also 
threw in, at the same time, a golden goblet of 
great value, and a Persian cimetar. The an- 
cient historian who records these facts was un- 
certain whether those offerings were intended 
as acts of adoration addressed to the sun, or as 
oblations presented to the sea — a sort of peace 



CROSSING THE HELLESPONT. 101 

offering, perhaps, to soothe the feelings of tlie 
mighty monster, irritated and chafed by the 
chastisement which it had previously received. 
One circumstance indicated that the offering 
was intended for the sun, for, at the time of 
making it Xerxes addressed to the great lumi- 
nary a sort of petition, which might be consid- 
ered either an apostrophe or a prayer, imploring 
its protection. He called upon the sun to ac- 
company and defend the expedition, and to pre- 
serve it from every calamity until it should 
have accomplished its mission of subjecting all 
Europe to the Persian sway. 

The army then commenced its march. The 
order of march was very much the same as that 
which had been observed in the departure from 
Sardis. The beasts of burden and the baggage 
were preceded and followed by immense bodies 
of troops of all nations. The whole of the 
first day was occupied by the passing of this 
part of the army. Xerxes himself, and the 
sacred portion of the train, were to follow them 
on the second day. Accordingly there came, 
on the second day, first, an immense squadron 
of horse, with garlands on the heads of the 
horsemen ; next, the sacred horses and the 
sacred car of Jupiter. Then came Xerxes him- 
self, in his war chariot, with trumpets sounding, 
and banners waving in the air. At the moment 
when Xerxes's chariot entered upon the bridge, 



102 XEKXES. 

the fleet of galleys, which had been drawn np 
in preparation near the Asiatic shore, were 
set in motion, and moved in a long and majestic 
line across the strait to the European side, 
accompanying and keeping pace with their 
mighty master in his progress. Thus was 
spent the second day. 

Five more days were consumed in getting 
over the remainder of the army, and the im- 
mense trains of beasts and of baggage which 
followed. The officers urged the work forward 
as rapidly as possible, and, toward the end, as 
is always the case in the movement of such enor- 
mous masses, it became a scene of inconceiv- 
able noise, terror, and confusion. The officers 
drove forward men and beasts alike by the 
lashes of their whips — every one struggling, 
under the influence of such stimulants, to get 
forward — while fallen animals, broken wagons, 
and the bodies of those exhausted and dying 
with excitement and fatigue, choked the way. 
The mighty mass was, however, at last trans- 
ferred to the European continent, full of anx- 
ious fears in respect to what awaited them, but 
yet having very faint and feeble conceptions of 
the awful scenes in which the enterprise of 
their reckless leader was to end. 




CHAPTER VI. 



THE KE\ lEW OF THE TROOPS AT DOKISCUS. 



As soon as the expedition of Xerxes li5id 
crossed the Hellespont and arrived safel}^ on the 
European side, as narrated in the last chapter, 
it became necessary for the fleet and the army 
to separate, and to move, for a time, in opposite 
directions from each other. The reader will 
observe, by examining tlie map, that the army, 
on reaching the European shore, at the poiiit 
to which they would he conducted by a bridge 
at Abydos, would find themselves in the middle 
of a long and narrow peninsula called tbe 
Chersonesus, and that, before commencing its 
regular march along the northern coast of the 
/Egean Sea, it would be necessary first to pro- 
ceed for fifteen or twenty miles to the eastward, 
in order to get round the bay -by which the pen- 
insula is bounded on tlie north and west. 
While, therefore, the fleet went directly west- 
ward along the coast, the army turned to the 
eastward, a place of rendezvous having been 
appointed on the northern coast of the sea, 

where they were all soon to meet again. 

103 



10-4 XERXES, 

The army moved on by a slow and toilsome 
progress until it reached the neck of the 
peninsula, and then turning at the head of 
the bay, it moved westward again, following 
the direction of the coast. The line of march 
was, however, laid at some distance from the 
shore, partly for the sake of avoiding the in- 
dentations made in the land by gulfs and bays, 
and partly for the sake of crossing the streams 
from the interior at points so far inland that the 
water found in them should be fresh and pure. 
Notwithstanding these precautions, however, 
the water often failed. So immense were the 
multitudes of men and of beasts, and so crav- 
ing was the thirst which the heat and the fa- 
tigues of the march engendered, that, in several 
instances, they drank the little rivers dry. 

The first great and important river which 
the army had to pass after entering Europe 
was the Hebrus. Xot far from the mouth of 
the Hebrus, where it emptied into the ^gean 
Sea, was a great plain, which was called the 
plain of Doriscus. There was an extensive 
fortress here, which had been erected by the 
orders of Darius wlien he had subjugated this 
part of the country. The position of this 
fortress was an important one, because it com- 
manded the whole region watered by the He- 
brus, which was a very fruitful and populous 
district. Xerxes had been intending to have 



REVIEW OB"' THE TROOPS. 105 

a grand review and enumeration of liis forces 
on entering the European territories, and lie 
judged Doriscus to be a very suitable place 
for his purpose. He could establish his own 
headquarters in the fortress, while his armies 
could be marshaled and reviewed on the 2:)lain. 
The fleet, too, had been ordered to draw up to 
the shore at the same spot, and when the army- 
reached the ground, they found the vessels 
already in the oflfing. 

The army accordingly halted, and the nec- 
essary arrangements were made for the review. 
The first thing was to ascertain the numbers 
of the troops ; and as the soldiers were too nu- 
merous to be counted, Xerxes determined to 
measure the mighty mass as so much bulk, and 
then ascertain the numbers by a computation. 
They made the measure itself in the following 
manner : They counted off, first, ten thousand 
meii, and brought them together in a compact 
circular mass, in the middle of the plain, and 
then marked a line upon the ground inclosing 
them. Upon this line, thus determined, they 
built a stone wall, about four feet high, with 
openings on opposite sides of it, by which men 
might enter and go out. AVhen the wall was 
built, soldiers were sent into the inclosure — 
just as corn would be poured by a husbandman 
into a wooden peck — until it was full. The \/^ 
mass thus required to fill the inclosure was 



106 XERXES. 

deemed and taken to be ten thousand men. 
This was the first filling of the measure. These 
men were then ordered to retire, and a fresh 
mass was introduced, and so on until the whole 
army was measured. The inclosure was filled 
one hundred and seventy times with the foot 
soldiers before the process was completed, indi- 
cating, as the total amount of the infantry of 
the army, a force of one million seven hundred 
thousand men. This enumeration, it must be 
remembered, included the land forces alone. 

This method of measuring the army in bulk 
was applied only to the foot soldiers ; they 
constituted the great mass of the forces con- 
vened. There were, however, various other 
bodies of troops in the army, which, from their 
nature, were more systematically organized 
than the common foot soldiers, and so their 
numbers were known by the regular enrollment. 
There was, for example, a cavalry force of 
eighty thousand men. There was also a corps 
of Arabs, on camels, and another of Egyptians, 
in war chariots, which together amounted to 
twenty thousand. Then, besides these land 
forces, there were half a million of men in the 
fleet. Immense as these numbers are, they 
were still further increased, as the army moved 
on, by Xerxes's system of compelling the forces 
af every kingdom and province through which 
he passed to join the expedition ; so that, at 



V 



REVIEW OP THE TKOOPS. 107 

length, when the Persian king fairly entered 
the heart of the Greek territory, Herodotus, 
the great narrator of Jiis history, in summing up 
the whole number of men regularly connected / 
with the army, makes a total of about five mil- 
lions of men ! One hundred thousand men, 
which is but one fiftieth part of five millions, 
is considered, in modern times, an immense 
army ; and, in fact, half even of that number 
was thought, in the time of the American 
Revolution, a sufficient force to threaten tlie 
colonies with overwhelming destruction. *^If 
ten thousand men will not do to put down 
the rebellion,^^ said an orator in the House of 
Commons, ^' fifty thousand shall." 

Herodotus adds that, besides the five millions 
regularly connected with the army, there was 
an immense and promiscuous mass of women, 
slaves, cooks, bakers, and camp followers of 
every description, that no human powers could 
estimate or number. 

But to return to the review. The numbers 
of the army having been ascertained, the next 
thing was to marshal and arrange the men by 
nations under their respective leaders, to be re- 
viewed by the king. A ver}'- full enumeration 
of these divisions of the army is given by tlie 
historians of tlie day, Avith minute descriptions 
of the kind of armor which the troops of the 
several nations wore. There were more than 



108 XERXES. 

fifty of these nations in all. Some of them were 
highly civilized, others were semi-barbarous 
tribes ; and, of course, they presented, as mar- 
shaled in long array upon the plain, every pos- 
sible variety of dress and equipment. Some 
were armed with brazen helmets, and coats of 
mail formed of plates of iron ; others wore lin- 
en tunics, or rude garments made of the skins 
of beasts. The troops of one nation had their 
heads covered with helmets, those of another 
with meters, and of a third with tiaras. There 
was one savage-looking horde that had caps 
made of the skin of the upper part of a horse^s 
head, in its natural form, with the ears stand- 
ing up erect at the top, and the mane flowing 
down behind. These men held the skins of 
cranes before them instead of shields, so that 
they looked like horned monsters, half beast 
and half bird, endeavoring to assume the guise 
and attitude of men. There was another corps 
whose men were really horned, since they Wore 
caps made from the skins of the heads of oxen, 
with the horns standing. Wild beasts were 
personated, too, as well as tame ; for some na- 
tions were clothed in lions' skins, and others in 
panthers' skins — the clothing being considered, 
apparently, the more honorable, in proportion 
to the ferocity of the brute to which it had orig- 
inally belonged. 
The weapons, too, were of every possible form 



BEVIEW OF THE TROOPS. 109 

and guise. Spears — some pointed with iron, 
some with stone, and others sliaped simply by 
being burned to a point in the fire ; bows and 
arrows, of every variety of material and form ; 
swords, daggers, slings, clubs, darts, javelins, 
and every other imaginable species of weapon 
which human ingenuity, savage or civilized, 
had then conceived. Even the lasso — the 
weapon of the American aborigines of modern 
times — was there. It is described by the an- 
cient historian as a long thong of leather wound 
into a coil, and finished in a noose at the end, 
which noose the rude warrior who used the 
implement launched through the air at the en- 
emy, and entangling rider and horse togethe 
by means of it, brought them both to the 
ground. 

There was every variety of taste, too, in the 
fashion and the colors of the dresses which were 
worn. Some were of artificial fabrics, and dyed 
in various and splendid hues. Some were very 
plain, the wearers of them affecting a simple 
and savage ferocity in the fashion of their vest- 
ure. Some tribes had painted skins — beauty, 
in their view, consisting, apparently, in hide- 
ousness. There was one barbarian horde who 
wore very little clothing of any kind. They 
had knotty clubs for weapons, and, in lieu of a 
dress, they had painted their naked bodies half 
white and half a bright vermilion. 



110 XERXES. 

In all tliis vast array, the corps whicli stood 
at the head, in respect to their rank and the 
costliness and elegance of their equipment, was 
a Persian squadron of ten thousand men, called 
the Immortals. They had received this desig- 
nation from the fact that the body was kept al- 
ways exactly full, as, whenever any one of the 
number died, another soldier was instantly put 
into his place, whose life was considered in 
some respects a continuation of the existence 
of the man who had fallen. Thus, by a fiction 
somewhat analogous to that by which the king, 
in England, never dies, these ten thousand Per- 
sians were an immortal band. They were all 
carefully-selected soldiers, and they enjoyed 
very unusual privileges and honors. They were 
mounted troops, and their dress and their 
armor were richly decorated with gold. They 
were accompanied in their campaigns by their 
wives and families, for whose use carriages were 
provided which followed the camp, and there 
was a long train of camels besides, attached to 
the service of the corps, to carry their provisions 
and their baggage. 

While all these countless varieties of land 
troops were marshaling and arranging them- 
selves upon the plain, each under its own offi- 
cers and around its own standards, the naval 
commanders were employed in bringing up the 
fleet of galleys to the shore, wdiere they were 



REVIEW OF THE TROOPS. Ill 

anchored in a long line not far from the beach, 
and with their jorows toward the land. Thus 
there was a space of oi:)en water left between 
the line of vessels and the beach, along which 
Xerxes^s barge was to pass when the time for 
the naval part of the review should arrive. 

When all things were ready, Xerxes mounted 
his war chariot and rode slowly around the 
plain, surveying attentively, and with great in- 
terest and pleasure, the long lines of soldiers, 
in all their variety of equipment and costume, 
as they stood displayed before him. It required 
a progress of many miles to see them all. When 
this review of the land forces was concluded, 
the king went to the shore, and embarked on 
board a royal galley which had been prepared 
for him, and there, seated upon the deck under 
a gilded canopy, he was rowed by the oarsmen 
along the line of ships, between their j-)rows and 
the land. The ships were from many nations 
as well as the soldiers, and exhibited the same 
variety of fashion and equipment. The land 
troops had come from the inland realms and 
provinces which occupied the heart of Asia, 
while the ships and the seamen had been fur- 
nished by the maritime regions which extended 
along the coasts of the Black, and the ^gean, 
and the Mediterranean Seas. Thus the people 
of Egypt had furnished two hundred ships, the 
Phoenicians three hundred, Cyprus fifty, the 



112 XERXES. 

Cilicians and the lonians one hundred each, 
and so with a great many other nations and 
tribes. 

The various squadrons which were thus com- 
bined in forming this immense fleet were 
manned and officered, of course, from the na- 
tions that severally furnished them, and one of 
them was actually commanded in person by a 
queen. The name of this lady admiral was 
Artemisia. She was the Queen of Caria, a small 
province in the southwestern part of Asia 
Minor, having Halicarnassus for its capital. 
Artemisia, though in history called a queen, 
was, in reality, more properly a regent, as she 
governed in the name of her son, who was yet 
a child. The quota of ships which Caria was 
to furnish was five. Artemisia, being a lady of 
ambitious and masculine turn of mind, and 
fond of adventure, determined to accompany the 
expedition. Not only her own vessels, but also 
those from some neighboring islands, were 
placed under her charge, so that she com- 
manded quite an important division of the fleet. 
She proved, also, in the course of the voyage, 
to be abundantly qualified for the discharge of 
her duties. She became, in fact, one of the 
ablest and most efficient commanders in the 
fleet, not only maneuvering and managing her 
own particular division in a very successful 
manner, but also taking a very active and im- 



REVIEW OF THE TROOPS. 11»] 

portaiitpart in the general consultations, where 
what she said was listened to with great re- 
spect, and always had great weight in deter- 
mining the decisions. In the great battle of 
Salainis she acted a very conspicuous part, as 
will hereafter appear. 

The whole number of galleys of the first class 
in Xerxes's fleet was more than twelve hundred, 
a number abundantly sufficient to justify the 
apprehensions of Artabanus that no harbor 
would be found capacious enough to shelter them 
in the event of a sadden storm. The line which 
they formed on this occasion, when drawn up 
side by side upon the shore for review, must have 
extended many miles. 

Xerxes moved slowly along this line in his 
barge, attended by the officers of his court and 
the great generals of his army, who surveyed 
the various ships as they passed them, and noted 
the diverse national costumes and equipments 
of the men with curiosity and pleasure. 
Among those who attended the king on this oc- 
casion was a certain Greek named Demaratus, 
an exile from his native land, who had fled to 
Persia, and had been kindly received by Darius 
some years before. Having remained in the 
Persian court until Xerxes succeeded to the 
throne and undertook the invasion of Greece, he 
concluded to accompany the expedition. 

The story of the political difficulties in which 



114 XERXES. 

Demaratus became involved in his native land, 
and which led to his flight from Greece, was 
very extraordinary. It was this : 

The mother of Demaratus was the daughter 
of parents of high rank and great affluence in 
Sparta, but in her childhood her features were 
extremely plain and repulsive. Now there was 
a temple in the neighborhood of the place where 
her parents resided, consecrated to Helen, a 
princess who, while she lived, enjoyed the fame 
of being the most beautiful woman in the world. 
The nurse recommended that the child should 
be taken every day to this temple, and that pe- 
titions should be offered there at the shrine of 
Helen that the repulsive deformity of her feat- 
ures might be removed. The mother consented 
to this plan, only enjoining upon the nurse not 
to let any one see the face of her unfortunate 
offspring in going and returning. The nurse 
accordingly carried the child to the temple day 
after day, and, holding it in her arms before the 
shrine, implored the mercy of Heaven for her 
helpless charge, and the bestowal upon it of the 
boon of beauty. 

These petitions were, it seems, at length 
heard, for one day, when the nurse was coming 
down from the temple, after offering her cus- 
tomary prayer, she was met and accosted by a 
mysterious-looking woman, who asked her what 
it was that she was carrying in her arms. The 



REVIEW OF THE TROOPS. 115 

nurse replied tliat it was a child. The woman 
wanted to look at it. The nurse refused to show 
the face of the child, saying that she had been 
forbidden to do so. The woman, however, in- 
sisted upon seeing its face, and at last the nurse 
consented and removed the coverings. The 
stranger stroked down the face of the child, say- 
ing, at the same time, that now that child should 
become the most beautiful woman of SjDarta. 

Her words proved true. The features of the 
young girl rapidly changed, and her counte- 
nance soon became as wonderful for its loveli- 
ness as it had been before for its hideous defor- 
mity. When she arrived at a projoer age, a 
certain Spartan nobleman named Agetus, aj^ar- 
ticular friend of the king's, made her his wife. 

The name of the king of Sjiarta at that time 
was Ariston. He had been twice married, and 
liis second wife was still living, but he had no 
children. When he came to see and to know 
the beautiful wife of Agetus, he wished to ob- 
tain her for himself, and began to revolve the 
subject in his mind, with a view to discover some 
method by which he might hope to accomplish 
his purpose. He decided at length upon the 
following plan. He proposed to Agetus to make 
an exchange of gifts, offering to give to him any 
one object which he might choose from all his, 
that is, Ariston's effects, provided that Agetus 
would, in the same manner, give to Ariston 



116 XERXES. 

whatever Ariston might choose. Agetus con- 
sented to the proposal, without, however, giving 
it any serious consideration. As Ariston was 
already married, he did not for a moment im- 
agine that his wife could be the object which 
the king would demand. The parties to this 
foolish agreement confirmed the obligation of 
it by a solemn oath, and then each made known 
to the other what he had selected. Agetus 
gained some jewel, or costly garment, or perhaps 
a gilded and embellished weapon, and lost for- 
ever his beautiful wife. Ariston repudiated his 
own second wife, and put the prize which he had 
thus surreptitiously acquired in her place as 
a third. 

About seven or eight months after this time 
Demaratus was born. The intelligence was 
brought to Ariston one day by a slave, when he 
was sitting at a public tribunal. Ariston seemed 
surprised at the intelligence, and exclaimed 
that the child was not his. He, however, after- 
ward retracted this disavowal, and owned 
Demaratus as his son. The child grew up, 
and iu process of time, when his father died, he 
succeeded to the throne. The magistrates, how- 
ever, who had heard the declaration of his father 
at the time of his birth, remembered it, and 
reported it to others ; and when Ariston died 
and Demaratus assumed the supreme power, 
the next heir denied his right to the succession. 



REVIEW OF THE TROOPS. IIT 

and ill process of time formed a strong party 
against him. A long series of civil dissensions 
arose, and at length the claims of Demaratus 
were defeated, his enemies triumphed, and he 
fled from the country to save his life. He ar- 
rived at Susa near the close of Darius's reign, 
and it was his counsel which led the king to 
decide the contest among his sons for the right 
of succession, in favor of Xerxes, as described 
at the close of the first chapter. Xerxes had 
remembered his obligations to Demaratus for 
this interposition. He had retained him in the 
royal court after his accession to the throne, 
and had bestowed upon him many marks of 
distinction and honor. 

Demaratus had decided to accompany Xerxes 
on his expedition into Greece, and now, while 
the Persian officers were looking with so much 
pride and pleasure on the immense preparations 
which they were making for the subjugation of 
a foreign and hostile state, Demaratus, too, was 
in the midst of the scene, regarding the specta- 
cle with no less of interest, probably, and yet, 
doubtless, with very different feelings, since the 
country upon which this dreadful cloud of 
gloom and destruction was about to burst was 
his own native land. 

After the review was ended, Xerxes sent for 
Demaratus to come to the castle. When he 
arrived, the king addressed him as follows : 

9— Xerxes 



118 XERXES. 

'^You are a Greek, Demaratiis, and yon 
know your countrymen well ; and now, as you 
have seen the fleet and the army that have been 
displayed here to-day, tell me what is your 
opinion. Do you think that the Greeks will 
undertake to defend themselves against such a 
force, or will they submit at once without at- 
tempting any resistance ? "' 

Demaratus seemed at first perplexed and un- 
certain, as if not knowing exactly what answer 
to make to the question. At length he asked 
the king whether it was his wish that he should 
respond by speaking the blunt and honest truth, 
or by saying what would be polite and agreeable. 

Xerxes replied that he wished him, of course, 
to speak the truth. The truth itself would be 
what he should consider the most agreeable. 

'' Since you desire it, then,^^ said Demaratus, 
'^I will speak the exact truth. Greece is the 
child of poverty. The inhabitants of the land 
have learned wisdom and discipline in the severe 
school of adversity, and their resolution and 
courage are absolutely indomitable. They all 
deserve this praise ; but I speak more particu- 
larly of my own countrymen, the people of 
Sparta. I am sure that they will reject any 
proposal which you may make to them for sub- 
mission to your power, and that they will resist 
you to the last extremity. The disparity of 
numbers will have no influence whatever on 



REVIEW OF THE TKOOPS. 119 

their decision. If till the rest of Greece were 
to submit to you, leaving the Spartans alone, 
and if they should find themselves unable to 
muster more than a thousand men, they would 
give you battle/^ 

Xerxes expressed great surprise at this asser- 
tion, and thought that Demaratus could not 
possibly mean wliat he seemed to say. ^^I ap- 
peal to yourself,"' said he ; " would you dare to 
encounter, alone, ten men ? You have been 
the prince of the Spartans, and a prince ought, 
at least, to be equal to two common men ; so 
that to show that the Spartans in general could 
be brought to fight a superiority of force of even 
ten to one, it ought to appear that you would 
dare to engage twenty. This is manifestly ab- 
surd. In fact, for any person to pretend to be 
able or willing to fight under such a disparity 
of numbers, evinces only pride and insolent 
presumption. And even this proportion of ten 
to one, or even twenty to one, is nothing com- 
pared to the real disparity ; for, even if we grant 
to the Spartans as large a force as there is any 
possibility of their obtaining, I shall then have 
a thousand to one against them. 

'^ Besides,"" continued the king, " there is a 
great difference in the character of the troops. 
The Greeks are all freemen, while my soldiers 
are all slaves — bound absolutely to do my bid- 
ding, without complaint or murmur. Such 



120 XERXES. 

soldiers as mine, who are habituated to subiiiit 
entirely to the will of another, and who live 
under the continual fear of the lash, might, per- 
haps, be forced to go into battle against a great 
superiority of numbers, or under other manifest 
disadvantages ; but free men, never. I do not 
believe that a body of Greeks could be brought 
to engage a body of Persians, man for man. 
Every consideration shows, thus, that the opin- 
ion which you have expressed is unfounded. 
You could only have been led to entertain such 
an opinion through ignorance and unaccount- 
able presumption."' 

^'' I was afraid,^"* replied Demaratus, "from 
the first, that, by speaking the truth, I should 
offend you. I should not have given you my 
real opinion of the Spartans if you had not 
ordered me to speak without reserve. You 
certainly cannot suppose me to have been in- 
fluenced by a feeling of undue partiality for 
the men whom I commended, since they have 
been my most implacable and bitter enemies, 
and have driven me into hopeless exile from 
my native land. Your father, on the other 
hand, received and protected me, and the sin- 
cere gratitude which I feel for the favors which 
I have received from him and from you incline 
me to take the most favorable view possible of 
the Persian cause. 

I certainly should not be willing, as you 



i( 



REVIEW OF THE TROOPS. 121 

justly suppose, to engage, alone, twenty men, 
or ten, or even one, unless there was an abso- 
lute necessity for it. I do not say that any 
single Lacedemonian could successfully en- 
counter ten or twenty Persians, although in 
personal conflicts they are certainly not inferior 
to other men. It is when they are combined 
in a body, even though that body be small, 
that their great superiority is seen. 

" As to their being free, and thus not easily 
led into battle in circumstances of imminent 
danger, it must be considered that their freedom 
is not absolute, like that of savages in a fray, 
where each acts according to his own individual 
will and pleasure, but it is qualified and con- 
trolled by law. The Spartan soldiers are not 
personal slaves, governed by the lash of a mas- 
ter, it is true ; but they have certain principles 
of obligation and duty which they all feel most 
solemnly bound to obey. They stand in greater 
awe of the authority of this law than your 
subjects do of the lash. It commands them 
never to fly from the field of battle, whatever 
may be the number of their adversaries. lb 
commands them to preserve their ranks, to 
stand firm at the posts assigned them, and there 
to conquer or die. 

'^ This is the truth in respect to them. If 
what I say seems to you absurd, I will in future 
be silent. I have spoken honestly what I think^ 



122 XERXES. 

because your majesty commanded me to do so ; 
and, notwithstanding what I have said, I sin- 
cerely wish that all your majesty's desires and 
expectations may be fulfilled/' 

The ideas which Demaratus thus appeared 
to entertain of danger to the countless and for- 
midable hosts of Xerxes's army, from so small 
and insignificant a power as that of Sparta, 
seemed to Xerxes too absurd to awaken any seri- 
ous displeasure in his mind. He only smiled, 
therefore, at Demaratus's fears, and dismissed 
him. 

Leaving a garrison and a governor in posses- 
sion of the castle of Doriscus, Xerxes resumed 
his march along the northern shores of the 
^gean Sea, the immense swarms of men filling 
all the roads, devouring everything capable of 
being used as food, either for beast or man, 
and drinking all the brooks and smaller rivers 
dry. Even with this total consumption of the 
food and the water which they obtained on the 
march, the supplies would have been found in- 
sufficient if the whole army had advanced 
through one tract of country. They accord- 
ingly divided the host into three great columns, 
one of which kept near the shore ; the other 
marched far in the interior, and the third in the 
intermediate space. They thus exhausted the 
resources of a very wide region. All the men, 
too, that were capable of bearing arms in the 



REVIEW OF THE TllOOPS. 123 

nations that these several divisions passed on 
the way, they compelled to join them, so that 
the army left, as it moved along, a very broad 
extent of country trampled down, impoverished, 
desolate, and full of lamentation and wo. The 
whole march was perhaps the most gigantic 
crime against the riglits and the happiness of 
man that human wickedness has ever been able 
to commit. 

The army halted, from time to time, for 
various purposes, sometimes for the perform- 
ance of what they considered religious ceremo- 
nies, Avhich were intended to propitiate the 
supernatural powers of the earth and of the air. 
When they reached the Strymon, where, it will 
be recollected, a bridge had been previously 
built so as to be ready for the army when it 
should arrive, they offered a sacrifice of five 
white horses to the river. In the same region, 
too, they halted at a place called the Nine 
Ways, where Xerxes resolved to offer a human 
sacrifice to a certain god whom the Persians 
believed to reside in the interior of the earth. 
The mode of sacrificing to this god was to bury 
the wretched yictims alive. The Persians 
seized, accordingly, by Xerxes's orders, nine 
young men and nine girls from among the 
people of the country, and buried them aliw ! 

]\larc]iing slowly on in this manner, the army 
at length reached the point upon the coast 



124 XERXES. 

where the canal had been cut across the isth- 
mus of Mount Athos. The town which was 
nearest to this spot was Acanthus, the situation 
of which, together with that of the canal, will 
be found upon the map. The fleet arrived at 
this point by sea nearly at the same time with 
the army coming by land. Xerxes examined 
the canal, and was extremely well satisfied 
with its construction. He commended the 
chief engineer, whose name was Artachaees, in 
the highest terms, for the successful manner 
in which he had executed the work, and ren- 
dered him very distinguished honors. 

It unfortunately happened, however, that, a 
few days after the arrival of the fleet and the 
army at the canal, and before the fleet had 
commenced the passage of it, that Artachaees 
died. The king considered this event as a se- 
rious calamity to him, as he expected that other 
occasions would arrive on which he would have 
occasion to avail himself of the engineer's 
talents and skill. He ordered preparations to 
be made for a most magnificent burial, and the 
body was in due time deposited in the grave 
with imposing funeral solemnities. A very 
splendid monument, too, was raised upon the 
spot, which employed, for some time, all the 
mechanical force of the army in its erection. 

While Xerxes remained at Acanthus, he re- 
quired the people of the neighboring country 



FvEVIEW 01^ THE TROOPS. 125 

to entertain his army at a grand feast, the cost 
of which totally ruined them. Not only wus all 
the food of the vicinity consumed, but all the 
means and resources of the inhabitants, of 
every kind, were exhausted in the additional 
supplies which they had to procure from the 
surrounding regions. At this feast the army 
in general ate, seated in groups upon the 
ground, in the open air ; but for Xerxes and 
the nobles of the court a great pavilion was 
built, where tables were spread, and vessels and 
furniture of silver and gold, suitable to the 
dignity of the occasion, were provided. Almost 
all the property which the people of the region 
had accumulated by years of patient industry 
was consumed at once in furnishing the vast 
amount of food which was required for this 
feast, and the gold and silver plate which was 
to be used in the pavilion. During the enter- 
tainment, the inhabitants of the country waited 
upon their exacting and insatiable guests until 
they were utterly exhausted by the fatigues of 
the^ service, When, at length, the feast was 
ended, and Xerxes and his company left the 
pavilion, the vast assembly outside broke up in 
disorder, pulled the pavilion to pieces, plun- 
dered the tables of the gold and silver plate, 
and departed to their several encampments, 
leaving nothing behind them. 

The inhabitants of the country were so com- 



126 



XERXES. 



pletely inipoverislied and ruined by these ex- 
actions, that those who were not impressed 
into Xerxes^s service and compelled to follow 
his army, abandoned their homes, and roamed 
away in the hope of finding elsewhere the 
means of subsistence which it was no longer 
possible to obtain on their own lands ; and thus, 
when Xerxes at last gave orders to the fleet to 
pass through the canal, and to his army to 
resume its march, he left the whole region 
utterly depopulated and desolate. 

He went on to Therma, a port situated on 
the northwestern corner of the ^gean Sea, 
which was the last of his places of rendezvous 
before his actual advance into Greece. 





CHAPTER VII. 



THE PREPARATIONS OF THE GREEKS 
FOR DEFENSE. 

We must now leave, for a time, the operations 
of Xerxes and his army, and turn our attention 
to the Greeks, and to the preparations which 
they were making to meet the ^emergency. 

The two states of Greece which were most 
prominent in the transactions connected with 
the invasion of Xerxes were Athens and Sparta. 
By referring to the map, Athens will be found 
to have been situated upon a promontory just 
without the Peloponnesus, while Sparta, on 
the other hand, was in the center of a valley 
which lay in the southern part of the peninsula. 
Each of these cities was the center and strong- 
hold of a small but very energetic and powerful 
commonwealth. The two states were entirely 
independent of each other, and each had its 
own peculiar system of government, of usages, 
and of laws. These systems, and, in fact, the 
characters of the two communities, in all re- 
spects, were extremely dissimilar. 

^ 127 



128 XERXES. 

Both these states^, though m name republics, 
had certain magistrates, called commonly, in 
history, kings. These kings were, however, in 
fact, only military chieftains, commanders of 
the armies rather than sovereign rulers of the 
state. The name by which such a chieftain 
was actually called by the people themselves, 
in those days, was tyrannus, the name from 
which our word tyrant is derived. As, how- 
ever, the word tyrannus had none of that op- 
probrious import which is associated with its 
English derivative, the latter is not now a suit- 
able substitute for the former. Historians, 
therefore, commonly use the word king instead, 
though that word does not properly express the 
idea. They were commanders, chieftains, he- 
reditary generals, but not strictly kings. We 
shall, however, often call them kings, in these 
narratives, in conformity with the general usage. 
Demaratus, Avho had fled from Sparta to seek 
refuge with Darius, and who was now accom- 
panying Xerxes on his march to Greece, was 
one of these kings. 

It was a peculiarity in the constitution of 
Sparta that, from a very early period of its his- 
tory, there had been always two kings, who had 
held the supreme command in conjunction with 
each other, like the Roman consuls in later 
times. This custom was sustained partly by 
the idea that by this division of the executive 



THE GREEKS. 129 

power of the state, the exercise of the powct 
was less likely to become despotic or tyrannical. 
It had its origin, however, according to the an- 
cient legends, in the following singular occur- 
rences : 

At a very early period in the history of Sparta, 
when the people had always been accustomed, 
like other states, to liave one prince or chief- 
tain, a certain prince died, leaving his wife, 
whose name was Argia, and two infant children, 
as his survivors. The children were twins, and 
the father had died almost immediately after 
they were born. Now the office of king was 
in a certain sense hereditary, and yet not abso- 
lutely so ; for the people were accustomed to 
assemble on the death of the king, and deter- 
mine who should be his successor, choosing al- 
ways, however, the oldest son of the former 
monarch, unless there was some very extraor- 
dinary and imperious reason for not doing so. 
In this case they decided, as usual, that the 
oldest son should be king. 

But here a very serious difficulty arose, which 
was, to determine which of the twins was the 
oldest son. They resembled each other so 
closely that no stranger could distinguish 
one from the other at all. The mother said 
that she could not distinguish them, and that 
she did not know which Avas the first-born. 
Til is was not strictly true ; for she did, in fact, 



130 XERXES. 

know, and only denied lier power to decide the 
question because she wished to have both of her 
children kings. 

In this perplexity the Spartans sent to the 
oracle at Delphi to know what they were to do. 
The oracle gave, as usual, an ambiguous and 
unsatisfactory response. It directed the people 
to make both the children kings, but to render 
the highest honors to the first-born. When 
this answer was reported at Sparta, it only in- 
creased the difficulty; for how were they to 
render peculiar honors to the first-born unless 
they could ascertain which the first-born was ? 

Ill this dilemma, some person suggested to 
the magistrates that perhaps Argia really knew 
which was the eldest child, and that if so. by 
watching her, to see whether she washed and 
fed one, uniformly, before the other, or gave it 
precedence in any other way, by which her la- 
tent maternal instinct or partiality might ap- 
pear, the question might possibly be determined. 
This plan was accordingly adopted. The mag- 
istrates contrived means to place a servant maid 
in the house to watch the mother in the way 
proposed, and the result was that the true order 
of birth was revealed. From that time forward, 
while they were both considered as princes, the 
one now supposed to be the first-born too"k pre- 
cedence of the other. 

When, however, the children arrived at an 



THE GREEKS. 181 

asQ to assume the exercise of the governmental 
powers, as there was no perce[)tible ditlurence 
between them in age, or strength, or accom- 
plishments, the one who had been decided to 
be the younger was little disposed to submit to 
the other. Each had his friends and adherents, 
parties were formed, and a long and angry civil 
dissension.ensued. In the end the question was 
compromised, the command was divided, and 
the system of having two chief magistrates be- 
came gradually established, the power descend- 
ing in two lines, from father to son, through 
many generations. Of course there was per- 
petual jealousy and dissension, and often open 
and terrible conflicts, between these two rival 
lines. 

The Spartans were an agricultural peoi^le, 
cultivating the valley in the southeastern part 
of the Peloponnesus, the waters of which were 
collected and conveyed to the sea by the Eiver 
Eurotas and its branches. They lived in the 
plainest possible manner, and prided themselves 
on the stern and stoical resolution with which 
they rejected all the refinements and luxuries 
of society. Courage, hardihood, indifference to 
life, and the power to endure without a mur- 
mur the most severe and protracted sufferings, 
were the qualities which they valued. They 
despised wealtli just as other nations despise 
effeminacy and foppery. Their laws discour- 

10 — Xer\e« 



132 XERXES. 

aged commerce, lest it should make some of the 
people rich. Their clothes were scanty and 
plain, their houses were comfortless, their food 
was a coarse bread, hard and brown, and their 
money was of iron. With all this, however, 
they were the most ferocious and terrible sol- 
diers in the world. 

They were, moreover, with all their plain- 
ness of manners and of life, of a very proud and 
lofty spirit. All agricultural toil, and every 
other species of manual labor in their state, were 
performed by a servile peasantry, while the free 
citizens, wliose profession was exclusively that 
of arms, were as aristocratic and exalted in soul 
as any nobles on earth. People are sometimes, 
in our day, when money is so much valued, 
proud, notwithstanding their poverty. The 
Spartans were proud of their poverty itself. 
They could be rich if they chose, but they de- 
spised richos. They looked down on all the re- 
finements and delicacies of dress and of living 
from an elevation far above them. They looked 
down on labor, too, with the same contempt. 
They were yet very nice and particular about 
their dress and military appearance, though 
everything pertaining to both was coarse and 
simple, and they had slaves to wait upon them 
even in their campaigns. 

The Athenians were a totally different peo- 
ple. Tiie leading classes in their common- 



THE GREEKS. 



133 



wealth were cultivated, intellectual, and refined. 
The city of Athens was renowned for the 
splendor of its architecture, its temples, its cit- 
adels, its statues, and its various public institu- 
tions, which in subsequent times made it the 
great intellectual center of Europe. It was 
populous and wealthy. It had a great com- 
merce and a powerful fleet. The Spartan char- 
acter, in a word, was stern, gloomy, indomita- 
ble, and wholly unadorned. The Athenians were 
rich, intellectual, and refined. The two nations 
were nearly equal in power, and were engaged 
in a perpetual and incessant rivalry. 

There were various other states and cities in 
Greece, but Athens and Sparta were at this 
time the most considerable, and they were al- 
together the most resolute and determined 
inliheir refusal to submit to the Persian sway. 
In fact, so well known and understood was the 
spirit of defiance with which these two powers 
were disposed to regard the Persian invasion, 
that when Xerxes sent his summons demand- 
ing submission, to the other states of Greece, 
he did not send any to these. When Darius in- 
vaded Greece some years before, he had sum- 
moned Athens and Sparta as well as the others, 
but his demands were indignantly rejected. 
It seems that the custom was for a government 
or a prince, when acknowledging the dominion 
of a superior power, to send, as a token of ter- 



134 XERXES. 

ritorial submission, a little earth and water^ 
which was a sort of legal form of giving up pos- 
session of their country to the sovereign who 
claimed it. Accordingly, when Darius sent his 
ambassadors into Greece to summon the coun- 
try to surrender, the ambassadors, according to 
the usual form, called upon the governments of 
the several states to send earth and water to the 
king. The Athenians, as has been already 
said, indignantly refused to comply with this 
demand. The Spartans, not content with a 
simple refusal, seized the ambassadors and 
threw them into a well, telling them, as they 
went down, that if they wanted earth and 
water for the King of Persia, they might get 
it there. 

The Greeks had obtained some information 
of Xerxes's designs against them before they 
received his summons. The first intelligence 
was communicated to the Spartans by Dema- 
ratus himself, while he was at Susa, in the fol- 
lowing singular manner. It was the custom, 
in those days, to write with a steel point on a 
smooth surface of wax. The wax was spread 
for this purpose on a board or tablet of metal, 
in a very thin stratum, forming a ground upon 
which the letters traced with the point were 
easily legible. Demaratus took two writing- 
tablets such as these, and removing the wax 
from them, he wrote a brief account of the pro- 



THE GREEKS. 135 

posed Persian invasion, by tracing ttie charac- 
ters upon the surface of the wood or metal 
itself, beneath ; tlien, restoring the wax so as 
to conceal the letters, he sent the two tab- 
lets, seemingly blank, to Leonidas, king of 
Sparta. The messengers wlio bore them had 
other pretexts for their journey, and they had 
various other articles to carry. The Persian 
guards, who stopped and examined the mes- 
sengers from time to time along the route, 
thought nothing of the blank tablets, and so 
they reached Leonidas in safety. 

Leonidas being a blunt, rough soldier, and 
not much accustomed to cunning contrivances 
himself, was not usually much upon the watch 
for them from others, and when he saw no ob- 
vious communication ujjon the tablets, he threw 
them aside, not knowing what the sending of 
them could mean, and not feeling any strong 
interest in ascertaining. His wife, however — 
her name was Gorgo — had more curiosity. 
There was something mysterious about the af- 
fair, and she wished to solve it. She examined 
the tablets attentively in every part, and at 
length removed cautiously a little of the wax. 
The letters began to appear. Full of excite- 
ment and pleasure, she proceeded with the work 
until the whole cereous coating was removed. 
The result was, that the communication was 
revealed, and Greece received the warning. 



136 XERXES. 

When the Greeks hearii that Xerxes was at 
Sardis^ they sent three messengers in disguise, 
to ascertain the facts in respect to the Persian 
army assembled there, and, so far as possible, 
to learn the plans and designs of the king. 
Nocwithstandiiio" all the efforts of these men to 
preserve their concealment and disguise, they 
were discovered, seized, and tortured by the 
Persian officer who took them, until they con- 
fessed that they were s])ies. The officer was 
about to put them to death, when Xerxes him- 
self received information of the circumstances. 
He forbade the execution, and directed, on the 
other hand, that the men should be conducted 
through all his encampments, and be allowed 
to view and examine everything. He then dis- 
missed them, with orders to return to Greece 
and report what they had seen. He thought^ 
he said, that the Greeks would be more likely 
to surrender if they knew how immense his prep- 
arations were for effectually vanquishing them 
if they attempted resistance. 

The city of Athens, being farther north than 
Sparta, would be the one first exposed to dan- 
ger from the invasion, and when the people 
heard of Xerxes^s approach, the whole city was 
filled with anxiety and alarm. Some of the in- 
habitants were panic-stricken, and wished to 
submit ; others were enraged, and uttered noth- 
ing but threats and defiance. A thousand dif- 



THE GKEEKS. 187 

ferent plans of defense were proposed and 
eagerly discussed. At lengtli the government 
sent messengers to tlie oracle at Delphi, to learn 
what their destiny was to be, and to obtain, if 
possible, divine direction in respect to the best 
mode of averting the danger. The messengers 
received an awful response, pretending, in wild 
and solemn^ though dark and mysterious lan- 
guage, the most dreadful calamities to the ill- 
fated city. The messengers were filled with 
alarm at hearing this reply. One of the inhab- 
itants of Delphi,, the city in which the oracle 
was situated, proposed to them to make a sec- 
ond application, in tlie character of the most 
humble supplicantoj and to implore that the or- 
acle would give them some directions in respect 
to the best course for them to pursue in order 
to avoid, or at least to mitigate the impending 
danger. They did so, and after a time they 
received an answer, vague, mysterious, and al- 
most unintelligible, bun which seemed to denote 
that the safety of the city was connected in 
some manner with Salamis, and with certain 
'' wooden walls, ^' to which the inspired distich 
of the response obscurely alluded. 

The messengers returned to Athens and re- 
ported the answer which they had received. 
The people were puzzled and perplexed in their 
attempts to understand it. It seems that the 
citadel of Athens had been formerlv surrounded 



138 XERXES. 

by a wooden palisade. Some thought that this 
was what was referred to by the ^' wooden 
walls/^ and that the meaning of the oracle was 
that they must rebuild the palisade, and then 
retreat to the citadel where the Persians should 
approach, and defend themselves there. 

Others conceived that the phrase referred to 
ships, and that the oracle meant to direct them 
to meet their enemies with a fleet upon the sea. 
Salamis, which was also mentioned by the 
oracle, was an island not far from Athens, being 
west of the city, between it and the Isthmus 
of Corinth. Those who supposed that by the 
^' wooden wall " was denoted the fleet, thought 
that Salamis might have been alluded to as the 
place near which the great naval battle was to 
be fought. This was the interpretation which 
seemed finally to prevail. 

The Athenians had a fleet of about two hun- 
dred galleys. These vessels had been purchased 
and built, some time before this, for the Athe- 
nian government, through the influence of a 
certain public officer of high rank and influence, 
named Themistocles. It seems that a large sum 
had accumulated in the public treasury, the 
produce of certain mines belonging to the city, 
and a proposal was made to divide it among the 
citizens, which would have given a small sum 
to each man,. Themistocles opposed this prop- 
osition, and urged instead that the government 



THE GREEKS. 139 

should build and equip a fleet with the mOney. 
This plan was finally adopted. The fleet was 
built, and it was. now determined to call it into 
active service io meet and repel the Persians, 
though the naval armament of Xerxes was six 
times as large. 

The next measure was to establish a confed- 
eration, if possible, of the Grecian states, or at 
least of all those who were willing to combine, 
and thus to form an allied army to resist the 
invader. The smaller states were very generally 
panic-stricken, and had either already signified 
their submission to the Persian rule, or were 
timidly hesitating, in doubt whether it would 
be safer for them to submit to the overwhelming 
force which was advancing against them, or to 
join the x\thenians and the Spartans in tlieir 
almost desperate attempts to resist it. The 
Athenians and Spartans settled, for the time, 
their own quarrels, and held a council to take 
the necessary measures for forming a more ex- 
tended confederation. 

All this took place while Xerxes was slowly 
advancing from Sardis to the Hellespont, and 
from the Hellespont to Doriscus, as described In 
the preceding chapter. 

The council resolved on despatching an 
embassy at once to all the states of Greece, as 
well as to some of the remoter neighboring 
powers, asking them to join the alliance. 



140 XERXES. 

Tile first Greek city to which these ambassa- 
dors came was Argos^ which was the capital of 
a kingdom or state lying between Athens and 
Sparta^ thongh within the Peloponnesus. The 
states of Argos and Sparta, being neighbors, 
had been constantly at war. Argos had recently 
lost six thousand men in a battle with the 
Spartans, and were, consequently, not likely to 
be in a very favorable mood for a treaty of 
friendship and alliance. 

When the ambassadors had delivered their 
message, the Argolians replied that they had 
anticipated such a proposal from the time that 
they had heard that Xerxes had commenced his 
march toward Greece, and that they had applied, 
accordingl}^, to the oracle at Delphi, to know 
what it would be best for them to do in case 
the proposal were made. The answer of the 
oracle had been, they said, unfavorable to their 
entering into an alliance with the Greeks. 
They were willing, however, they added, not- 
withstanding this, to enter into an alliance, 
offensive and defensive, with the Spartans, for 
thirty years, on condition that they should 
themselves have the command of half the Pelo- 
ponnesian troops. They were entitled to the 
command of the whole being, as they contended, 
the superior nation in rank, but they would 
waive their just claim, and be satisfied with half, 
if the Spartcins would agree to that arrangement* 



THE G KEEKS. 141 

The Spartans replied that they could not 
agree to those conditions. They were them- 
selves, they said, the superior nation in rank, 
and entitled to the whole command ; and as 
they had two kings, and Argos but one, there 
was a double difficulty in complying with the 
Argive demand. They could not surrender one 
half of the command without depriving one of 
their kings of his rightful power. 

Thus the proposed alliance failed entirely, 
the people of Argos saying that they would as 
willingly submit to the dominion of Xerxes 
as to the insolent demands and assumptions 
of superiority made by the government of 
Sparta. 

The ambassadors, among other countries 
which they visited in their attempts to obtain 
alliance and aid, went to Sicily. Gelon was the 
King of Sicily, and Syracuse was his capital. 
Here the same difficulty occuried which had 
broken up the negotiations at Argos. The 
ambassadors, when they arrived at Syracuse, 
represented to Gelon that, if the Persians sub- 
dued Greece, they would come to Sicily next, 
and that it was better for him and for his coun- 
trymen that they should meet the enemy while 
he was still at a distance, rather than to wait 
until he came near. Gelon admitted the just- 
ice of this reasoning, and said that he would 
furnish a large force, both of ships and men, for 



142 XERXES. 

carrying on the war, provided that he might 
have the command of the combined army. To 
this, of course, the Spartans would not agree. 
He then asked that he might command the 
fleet, on condition of giving up his claim to the 
land forces. This proposition the Athenian 
ambassadors rejected, saying to Gelon tliat what 
they were in need of, and came to him to obtain, 
was a supply of troops, not of leaders. The 
Athenians, they said, were to command the 
fleet, being not only the most ancient nation of 
Greece, but also the most immediately exposed 
to the invasion, so that they were doubly enti- 
tled to be considered as the principals and 
leaders in the war. 

Gelon then told the ambassadors that, since 
they wished to obtain everything and to con- 
cede nothing, they had better leave his domin- 
ions without delay, and report to their country- 
men that they had nothing to expect from 
Sicily. 

The ambassadors went then to Corcyra, a large 
island on the western coast of Greece, in the 
Adriatic Sea. It is now called Corfu. Here 
they seemed to meet with their first success. 
The people of Corcyra acceded to the propo- 
sals made to them, and promised at once to 
equip and man their fleet, and send it round 
into the ^gean Sea. They immediately en- 
gaged in the work, and seemed to be honestly 



THE GKEEKS. 143 

intent on fulfilling their promises. They were, 
however, in fact, only pretending. They were 
really undecided which cause to espouse, the 
Greek or the Persian, ana kept their promised 
squadron back by means of various delays, 
nntil its aid was no longer needed. 

But the most important of all these negotia- 
tions of the Athenians an-d Spartans with the 
neighboring states were those opened with Thes- 
saly. Thessaly was a kingdom in the northern 
part of Greece. It was, therefore, the territory 
which the Persian armies would first enter, on 
turning the northwestern corner of the ^gean 
Sea. There were, moreover, certain points in 
its geographical position, and in the physical 
conformation of the country, that gave it a pe- 
culiar importance in respect to the approaching 
conflict. 

By referring to the maj) placed at the com- 
mencement of the fifth chapter, it will be seen 
that Thessaly was a vast valley, surrounded on 
all sides by mountainous land, and drained by 
the River Peneus and its branches. The Pe- 
neus flows eastwardly to tlie jEgean Sea, and 
escapes from the great valley through a narrow 
and romantic pass lying between the Moun- 
tains Olympus and Ossa. This pass was called 
in ancient times the Olympic Straits, and a i^art 
of it formed a romantic and beautiful glen 
called the Vale of Tempe, There was a road 



144 XERXES. 

through this pass, which was the only access 
by which Thessaly could be entered from the 
eastward. 

To the south of the Vale of Tempe, the 
mountains, as will appear from the map, crowd- 
ed so hard upon the sea as not to allow any 
passage to the eastward to them. The natural 
route of Xerxes, therefore, in descending into 
Greece, would be to come down along the coast 
until he reached the mouth of the Peneus, and 
then, following the river up through the Vale 
of Tempe into "thessaly, to pass down toward 
the Peloponnesus on the western side of Ossa 
and Pelion, and of the other mountains near the 
sea. If he could get through the Olympic 
Straits and the Vale of Tempe, the way would 
be open and unobstructed until he should reach 
the southern frontier of Thessaly, where there 
was another . narrow pass leading from Thes- 
saly into Greece. This last defile was close to 
the sea, and was called the Straits of Ther- 
mopylae. 

Thus Xerxes and his hosts, in continuing 
their march to the southward, must necessarily 
traverse Thessaly, and in doing so they would 
have two narrow and dangerous defiles to pass : 
one at Mount Olympus, to get into the coun- 
try, and the other at Thermopylae, to get out 
of it. It consequently became a point of great 
importance to the Greeks to determine at which 




11-Xc 



THE GREEKS. 145 

of these two passes they shoiihl make their 
stand against the torrent which was coming 
down upon them. 

This question would, of course, depend very 
mucli upon the disposition of Thessaly herself. 
The government of that country, understand- 
ing the critical situation in which tlioy wore 
placed, had not waited for the Athenians and 
Spartans to send ambassadors to them, but, at 
a very early period of the war — before, in fact, 
Xerxes had yet crossed the Hellespont, had sent 
messengers to Athens to concert some plan of 
action. These messengers were to say to the 
Athenians that the government of Thessaly 
were expecting every day to receive a summons 
from Xerxes, and that they must speedily de- 
cide what they were to do ; that they them- 
selves were very unwilling to submit to him, 
but they could not undertake to make a stand 
against his immense host alone ; that the soutli- 
ern Greeks might include Thessaly in their 
plan of defense, or exclude it, just as tliey 
thought best. If they decided to include it, 
then they must make a stand at the Olympic 
Straits, that is at the pass between Olympus 
and Ossa ; and to do that, it would be neces- 
sary to send a strong force immediately to take 
possession of the pass. If, on the contrary, 
they decided wo/^ to defend Tliessaly, then the 
pass of Thermopylae would be the point at 



146 XERXES. 

which they must make their stand, and in that 
case Thessaly must be at liberty to submit on 
the first Persian summons. 

The Greeks, after consultation on the sub- 
ject, decided that it would be best for them to 
defend Thessaly, and to take their standi ac- 
cordingly, at the Straits of Olympus. They 
immediately put a large force on board their 
fleet, armed and equipped for the expedition. 
This was at the time when Xerxes was just 
about crossing the Hellespont. The fleet sailed 
from the port of Athens, passed up through the 
narrow strait called Euripus, lying between the 
island of EubG3a and the mainland, and finally 
landed at a favorable point of disembarkation, 
south of Thessaly. From this point the forces 
marched to the northward until they reached 
the Peneus, and then established themselves at 
the narrowest part of the passage between the 
mountains, strengthened their position there 
as much as possible, and awaited the coming 
of the enemy. The amount of the force was 
ten thousand men. 

They had not been here many days before a 
messenger came to them from the King of Mac- 
edon, which country, it will be seen, lies im- 
mediately north of Thessaly, earnestly dissuad- 
ing them from attempting to make a stand at 
the Vale of Tempe. Xerxes was coming on, 
he said, with an immense and overwhelming 



THE GREEKS. 147 

force, one against whicli it would be utterly 
impossible for them to make good their defense 
at such a point as that. It would be far better 
for them to fall back to Thermopylae which, 
being a narrower and more rugged pass, could 
be more easily defended. 

Besides this, the messenger said that it was 
possible for Xerxes to enter Thessaly without 
going through the Vale of Tempe at all. The 
country between Thessaly and Macedon was 
mountainous, but it was not impassable, and 
Xerxes would very probably come by that way. 
The only security, therefore, for the Greeks, 
would be to fall back and intrench themselves 
at Thermopylae. Nor was there any time to 
be lost. Xerxes was crossing the Hellespont, 
and the whole country was full of excitement 
and terror. 

The Greeks determined to act on this ad- 
vice. They broke up their encampment at the 
Olympic Straits, and, retreating to the south- 
wxird, established themselves at Thermopyhie, 
to await there the coming of the conqueror. 
The people of Thessaly then surrendered to 
Xerxes as soon as they received his summons. 

Xerxes, from his encampment at Therma, 
where we left him at the close of the last chap- 
ter, saw the peaks of Olympus and Ossa in the 
southern horizon. They were distant perhaps 
fifty miles from where he stood. He inquired 



148 XERXES. 

about them, and was told that the Eiver Peneus 
flowed between them to the cea, and that 
through the same defile there lay the main en- 
trance to Thessaly. He had previously de. 
termined to march his army round the other 
way, as the King of Macedon had suggested, 
but he said that he should like to see this de- 
file. So he ordered a swift Sidonian galley to 
be prepared, and, taking with him suitable 
guides and a fleet of other vessels in attend- 
ance on his galley, he sailed to the mouth of 
the Peneus, and, entering that river, he as- 
cended it until he came to the defile. 

Seen from any of the lower elevations which 
projected from the bases of the mountains at 
the head of this defile, Thessaly lay sj^read out 
before the eye as one vast valley — level, ver- 
dant, fertile, and bounded by distant groups and 
ranges of mountains, which formed a blue and 
beautiful horizon on every side. Through the 
midst of this scene of rural loveliness the 
Peneus^ with its countless branches, grace- 
fully meandered, gathering the water from 
every part of the valley, and then pouring it 
forth in a deep and calm current through the 
gap in the mountains at the observer's feeto 
Xerxes asked his guides if it would be pos- 
sible to find any other place where the waters 
of the Peneus could be conducted to the sea» 
They replied that it would not be^ for the 



THE GREEKS. 



149 



valley was bounded on every side by ranges of 
mountainous land. 

" Then/' said Xerxes, " the Thessalians were 




Departure of the Grecian Fleet for Thessaly. 
wise in submitting at once to my summons ; 
for, if they had not done so, I would have raised 
a vast embankment across the valley here, and 
thus stopped the river, turned their country 
into a lake, and drowned them uJJ/' 




CHAPTER VIII. 



THE ADVANCE OF XEEXES INTO GREECE. 



From Therma — the last of tlie great stations 
at which the Persian army halted before its 
final descent upon Greece — the army com- 
menced its march, and the fleet set sail, nearly 
at the same time, which was early in the 
summer. The army advanced slowly, meeting 
with the usual difficulties and delays, but with- 
out encountering any special or extraordinary 
occurrences, until, after having passed through 
Macedon into Thessaly, and through Thessaly to 
the northern frontier of Phocis, they began to 
approach the Straits of Thermopylae. What 
took place at Thermopylae will be made the 
subject of the next chapter. The movements 
of the fleet are to be narrated in this. 

In order distinctly to understand these move- 
ments, it is necessary that the reader should 
first have a clear conception of the geographical 
conformation of the coasts and seas along which 
the path of the expedition lay. By referring 

to the map of Greece, we shall see that the 
150 



ADVANCE INTO GREECE. 151 

course which the fleet would naturally take from 
Therma to the southeastward, along the coast, 
was unobstructed and clear for about a hundred 
miles. We then come to a group of four is- 
lands, extending in a range at right angles to 
the coast. The only one of these islands with 
which we have particularly to do in this history 
is the innermost of them, which was named 
Sciathus. Opposite to these islands the line of 
the coast, having passed around the point of a 
mountainous and rocky promontory called Mag- 
nesia, turns suddenly to the westward, and runs 
in that direction for about thirty miles, when 
it again turns to the southward and eastward 
as before. In the sort of corner thus cut off 
by the deflection of the coast lies the long is- 
land of Eaboea, which may be considered, in 
fact, as almost a continuation of the continent, 
as it is a part of the same conformation of 
country, and is separated from the main land 
only by submerged valleys on the north and on 
the east. Into these sunken valleys the sea of 
course flows, forming straits or channels. The 
one on the north was, in ancient times, called 
Artemisium, and the one on the west, at its 
narrowest point, Euripus. All these islands 
and coasts were high and picturesque. They 
were also, in the days of Xerxes, densely 
populated, and adorned profusely with temples, 
citadels, and towns. 



152 XERXES. 

On passing the soathernmost extremity of 
the island of Euboea, and turning to the west- 
ward, we come to a promontory of the main 
land, which constituted Attica, and in the 
middle of which the city of Athens was situ- 
ated. Beyond this is a capacious gulf, called the 
Saronian Gulf. It lies between Attica and the 
Peloponnesus. In the middle of the Saronian 
Gulf lies the island of ^gina, and in the north- 
ern part of it the island of Salamis. The prog- 
ress of the Persian fleet was from Therma 
down the coast to Sciathus, thence along the 
shores of Euboea to its southern point, and so 
round into the Saronian Gulf to the island of 
Salamis. The distance of this voyage was per- 
haps two hundred and fifty miles. In accom- 
plishing it the fleet encountered many dangers, 
and met with a variety of incidents, and events, 
which we shall now proceed to describe. 
J" The country, of course, was everywhere in 
/ a state of the greatest excitement and terror. 
The immense army was slowly coming down 
by land, and the fleet, scarcely less terrible, 
since its descents upon the coast would be so 
fearfully sudden and overwhelming when they 
were made, was advancing by sea. The in- 
habitants of the country were consequently in 
a state of extreme agitation. The sick and the 
infirm, who were, of course, utterly helpless in 
such a danger, exhibited everywhere the sj)ec- 



ADVANCE INTO GREECE. 153 

tacle of silent dismay. Mothers, wives, maid- 
ens, and children, on the other hand, wcro 
wild with excitement and terror. The men, 
too full of passion to fear, or too full of pride 
to allow their fears to be seen, were gathering 
in arms, or hurrying to and fro with intelli- 
gence, or making hasty arrangements to remove 
their wives and children from the scenes of 
cruel suffering which were to ensue. They 
stationed watchmen on the hills to give warn- 
ing of the approach of the enemy. They 
agreed upon signals, and raised piles of wood 
for beacon fires on every commanding eleva- 
tion along the coast ; while all the roads lead- 
ing from the threatened provinces to other 
regions more remote from the danger were 
covered with flying parties, endeavoring to 
make their escape, and carrying, wearily and 
in sorrow, whatever they valued most and were 
most anxious to save. Mothers bore their 
children, men their gold and silver, and sisters 
aided their sick or feeble brothers to sustain 
the toil and terror of the flight. 

All this time Xerxes was sitting in his war 
chariot, in the midst of his advancing army, 
full of exultation, happiness, and pride at the 
thoughts of the vast harvest of glory which all 
this panic and suffering were bringing him in. 

The fleet at length — which was under the 
command of Xerxes's brothers and cousins. 



154 XERXES. 

whom he had appointed the admirals of it — be- 
gan to move down the coast from Therma, with 
the intention of first sweeping the seas clear of 
any naval force which the Greeks might have 
sent forward there to act against them, and 
then of landing upon some point on the coast, 
wherever they could do so most advantageously 
for co-operation with the army on the land. 
The advance of the ships was necessarily slow. 
So immense a flotilla could not have been other- 
wise kept together. The admirals, however, 
selected ten of the swiftest of the galleys, and, 
after manning and arming them in the most 
perfect manner, sent them forward to recon- 
noiter. The ten galleys were ordered to ad- 
vance rapidly, but with the greatest circum- 
spection. They were not to incur any needless 
danger, but, if they met with any detached 
ships of the enemy, they were to capture them, 
if possible. They were, moreover, to be con- 
stantly on the alert, to observe everything, and 
to send back to the fleet all important intelli- 
gence which they could obtain. 

The ten galleys went on without observing 
anything remarkable until they reached the 
island of Sciathus. Here they came in sight 
of three Greek ships, a sort of advanced guard, 
which had been stationed there to watch the 
movements of the enemy. 

The Greek galleys immediately hoisted their 



ADVANCE INTO GREECE. 155 

anchors and fled ; the Persian galleys numned 
their oars, and j^ressed on after them. 

They overtook one of the guard-ships very 
soon, and, after a short conflict, they succeeded 
in cai^turing it. The Persians made prisoners 
of the officers and crew, and then, selecting 
from among them the fairest and most noble- 
looking man, just as they would have selected 
a bullock from a herd, they sacrificed him to 
one of their deities on the prow of the captured 
ship. This was a religious ceremony, intended 
to signalize and sanctify their victory. 

The second vessel they also overtook and cap- 
tured. The crew of this ship were easily sub- 
dued, as the overwhelming superiority of their 
enemies appeared to convince them that all re- 
sistance was hopeless, and to plunge them into 
despair. There was one man, however, who, it 
seems, could not be conquered. He fought like 
a tiger to the last, and only ceased to deal his 
furious thrusts and blows at the enemies that 
surrounded him when, after being entirely cov- 
ered with wounds, he fell faint and nearly life- 
less upon the bloody deck. When the conflict 
with him was thus ended, the murderous hos- 
tility of his' enemies seemed suddenly to bo 
changed into pity for his sufferings and admi- 
ration of his valor. They gathered around 
him, bathed and bound up his wounds, gave 
him cordials, and at length restored him to life. 



156 XERXES. 

Finally^ when tlie detachment returned to the 
fleet, some days afterward, they carried this 
man with them, and presented him to the com- 
manders as a hero worthy of the highest admi- 
ration and honor. The rest of the crew were 
made slaves. 

The third of the Greek guard-ships contrived 
to escape, or, rather, the crew escaped, while 
the vessel itself was taken. This ship, in its 
flight, had gone toward the north, and the crew 
at last succeeded in running it on shore on the 
coast of Thessaly, so as to escape, themselves, 
by abandoning the vessel to the enemy. The 
officers and crew, thus escaping to the shore, 
went through Thessaly into Greece, spreading 
the tidings everywhere that the Persians were 
at hand. This intelligence was communicated, 
also, along the coast, by beacon fires which the 
people of Sciathus built upon the heights of the 
island as a signal, to give the alarm to the coun- 
try southward of them, according to the pre- 
concerted plan. The alarm was communicated 
by other fires built on other heights, and sen^ 
tinels were stationed on every commanding em^ 
inence on the highlands of Eubosa toward th« 
south, to watch for the first appearance of the 
enemy. 

The Persian galleys that had been sent for- 
ward having taken the three Greek guard-ships, 
and finding the sea before them now clear of 



ADVANCE INTO GilEECE. 157 

all appearances of an enemy, conclutled to re- 
turn to the fleet with their prizes and their re- 
port. They had been directed, when they were 
despatched from the fleet, to hiy up a monu- 
ment of stones at the furthest point whicli they 
sliould reach in their cruise : a measure often 
resorted to in similar cases, by way of furnisli- 
ing proof that a party thus sent forward have 
really advanced as far as they pretend on their 
return. The Persian detachment had actually 
brought the stones for the erection of their land- 
mark with them in one of their galleys. The 
galley containing the stones, and two others to 
aid it, pushed on beyond Sciathus to a snuill 
rocky islet standing in a conspicuous position 
in the sea, and there the^ built their monument 
or cairn. The detachment then returned to 
meet the fleet. The time occupied by this 
whole expedition was eleven days. 

The fleet was, in the mean time, coming 
down along the coast of Magnesia. The whole 
company of ships had advanced safely and pros- 
perously thus far, but now a great calamity was 
about to befall them — the first of tlie series of 
disasters by which the expedition was ulti- 
mately ruined. It was a storm at sea. 

The fleet had drawn up for the night in a 
long and shallow bay on the coast. There was 
a rocky promontory at one end of this bay and 
a cape on the other, with a long beach between 



158 XERXES. 

them. It was a very good place of refuge and 
rest for the night in calm weather, but such a 
bay afforded very little shelter against a tem- 
pestuous wind, or even against the surf and 
swell of the sea, which were sometimes pro- 
duced by a distant storm. When the fleet en- 
tered this bay in the evening, the sea was calm 
and the sky serene. The commanders expected 
to remain there for the night, and to proceed 
on the voyage on the following day. 

The bay was not sufficiently extensive to 
allow of the drawing up of so large a fleet in a 
single line along the shore. The ships were ac- 
cordingly arranged in several lines, eight in all. 
The innermost of these lines was close to the 
shore ; the others were at different distances 
from it, and every separate ship was held to the 
place assigned it by its anchors. In this posi- 
tion the fleet passed the night in safety, but 
before morning there were'indications of a storm. 
The sky looked wild and lurid. A heavy swell 
came rolling in from the offing. The wind be- 
gan to rise, and to blow in fitful gusts. Its di- 
rection was from the eastward, so that its ten- 
dency was to drive the fleet upon the shore. 
The seamen were anxious and afraid, and the 
commanders of the several ships began to de- 
vise, each for his own vessel, the best means of 
safety. Some, whose vessels were small, drew 
them up upon the sand, above the reach of 



ADVANCE INTO GREECE. 159 

the swell. Others strengtliened the anchoring 
tackle, or added new anchors to those already 
down. Others raised their anchors altogether, 
and attempted to row their galleys away, up or 
down the coast, in hope of finding some better 
place of shelter. Thus all was excitement and 
confusion in the fleet, through the eager efforts 
made by every separate crew to escape the im- 
pending danger. 

In the mean time, the storm came on apace. 
The rising and roughening sea made the oars 
useless, and the wind howled frightfully through 
the cordage and the rigging. The galleys soon 
began to be forced away from their moorings. 
Some were driven upon the beach and dashed 
to pieces by the waves. Some were wrecked on 
the rocks at one or the other of the projecting 
points which bounded the bay on either hand. 
Some foundered at their place of anchorage. 
Vast numbers of men were drowned. Those 
who escaped to the shore were in hourly dread 
of an attack from the inhabitants of the coun- 
try. To save themselves, if possible, from this 
danger, they dragged up the fragments of the 
wrecked vessels upon the beach, and built a 
fort with them on the shore. Here they in- 
trenched themselves, and then prepared to de- 
fend their lives, armed with the weapons which, 
like the materials for their fort, were washed 
up, from time to time, by the sea. 

12— Xerxes' 



160 XERXES. 

The storm continued for three days. It de- 
stroyed about three hundred galleys, besides an 
immense number of provision transports and 
other smaller vessels. Great numbers of sea- 
men, also, were drowned. The inhabitants of 
the country along the coast enriched themselves 
with the plunder which they obtained from the 
wrecks, and from the treasures, and the gold 
and silver vessels, which continued for some 
time to be driven up upon the beach by the 
waves. The Persians themselves recovered, it 
was said, a great deal of valuable treasure, by 
employing a certain Greek diver, whom they 
had in their fleet, to dive for it after the storm 
was over. This diver, whose name was Scyl- 
lias, was famed far and wide for his power of 
remaining under water. As an instance of 
what they believed him capable of performing, 
they said that when, at a certain period subse- 
quent to these transactions, he determined to 
desert to the Greeks, he accomplished his de- 
sign by diving into the sea from the deck 
of a Persian galley, and coming up again 
in the midst of the Greek fleet, ten miles dis- 
tant ! 

After three days the storm subsided. The 
Persians then repaired the damages which had 
been sustained, so far as it was now possible to 
repair them, collected what remained of the 
fleet, took the shipwrecked mariners from their 



ADVANCE INTO GREECE. 161 

rude fortification on the beach, and set sail 
again on their voyage to the southward. 

In the mean time, the Greek fleet had as- 
sembled in the arm of the sea lying north of 
Euboea, and between Euboea and the main 
land. It was an allied fleet, made np of con- 
tributions from various states that had finally 
agreed to come into the confederacy. As is 
usually the case, however, with allied or confed- 
erate forces, they were not well agreed among 
themselves. The Athenians had furnished far 
the greater number of ships, and they consid- 
ered themselves, therefore, entitled to the com- 
mand ; but the other allies were envious and 
jealous of them on account of that very superi- 
ority of wealth and j^ower which enabled them 
to supply a greater portion of the naval force 
than the rest. They were willing that one of 
the Spartans should command, but they would 
not consent to put themselves under an Athe- 
nian. If an Athenian leader were chosen, they 
would disperse, they said, and the various por- 
tions of the fleet return to their respective 
homes. 

The Athenians, though burning with resent- 
ment at this unjust declaration, were compelled 
to submit to the necessity of the case. They 
could not take the confederates at their word, 
and allow the fleet to be broken up, for the de- 
fense of Athens was the great object for which 



162 XEKXES. 

it was assembled. The other states might 
make their peace with the conqueror by sub- 
mission, but the Athenians could not do so. In 
respect to the rest of Greece, Xerxes wished 
only for dominion. In respect to Athens, he 
wished for vengeance. The Athenians had 
burned the Persian city of Sard is, and he had 
determined to give himself no rest until he had 
burned Athens in return. 

It was well understood, therefore, that the 
assembling of the fleet, and giving battle to the 
Persians where they now were, was a plan 
adopted mainly for the defense and benefit of 
the Athenians. The Athenians, accordingly, 
waived their claim to command, secretly re- 
solving that, when the war was over, they 
would have their revenge for the insult and 
injury. 

A Spartan was accordingly appointed com- 
mander of the fleet. His name was Eurybiades. 

Things were in this state when the two fleets 
came in sight of each other in the strait be- 
tween the northern end of Euboeaand the main 
land. Fifteen of the Persian galleys, advanc- 
ing incautiously some miles in front of the rest, 
came suddenly upon the Greek fleet, and were 
all captured. The crews were made prisoners 
and sent into Greece. The remainder of the 
fleet entered the strait, and anchored at the 
eastern extremity of it, sheltered by the prom- 



ADVANCE INTO GREECE. 163 

ontory of Magnesia, which now lay to the 
north of them. 

The Greeks were amazed at the immense 
magnitude of the Persian fleet, and the first 
opinion of the commanders was, tliat it was 
wholly nseless for them to attempt to engage 
them. A council was convened, and, after a 
long and anxious debate, they decided that it 
was best to retire to the sou tli ward. The in- 
habitants of Euboea, who had been already in 
a state of great excitement and terror at the 
near approach of so formidable an enemy, were 
thrown, by this decision of the allies, into a state 
of absolute dismay. It was abandoning them 
to irremediable and hopeless destruction. 

The government of the island immediately 
raised a very large sum of money, and went 
with it to Themistocles, one of the most influ- 
ential of the Athenian leaders, and offeredit to 
him if he would contrive any way to persuade 
the commanders of the fleet to remain and give 
the Persians battle where they were. Themis- 
tocles took the money, and agreed to the condi- 
tion. He went witli a small part of it — though 
this part was a very considerable sum — to Eu- 
rybiades, the commander-in-chief, and offered 
it to him if he would retain the fleet in 
its present position. There were some other 
similar offerings made to other influential men, 
judiciously selected. All this was done in a 



164 XERXES. 

very private manner, and, of course, Tliemisto- 
cles took care to reserve to himself the lion^s 
share of the Euboean contribution. The effect 
of this money in altering the opinions of the 
naval officers was marvelous. A new council 
was called, the former decision was annulled, 
and the Greeks determined to give their enemies 
battle where they were. 

The Persians had not been unmindful of the 
danger that the Greeks might retreat by retir- 
ing through the Euripus, and so escape them. 
In order to prevent this, they secretly sent off 
a fleet of two hundred of their strongest and 
fleetest galleys, with orders to sail round Eubcea 
and enter the Euripus from the south, so as to 
cut off the retreat of the Greeks in that quar- 
ter. They thought that by this plan the Greek 
fleet would be surrounded, and could have no 
possible mode of escape. They remained, there- 
fore, with the principal fleet, at the outer en- 
trance of the northern strait for some days, be- 
fore attacking the Greeks, in order to give 
time for the detachment to pass round the 
island. 

The Persians sent off the two hundred gal- 
leys with great secrecy, not desiring that the 
Greeks should discover their design of thus in- 
tercepting their retreat. They did discover it, 
however, for this was the occasion on which the 
great diver, Scyllias, made his escape from one 



ADVANCE INTO GREECE. 165 

fleet to the other by swimming under water ten 
miles, and he brought the Greeks the tidings.* 
The Greeks desj^atched a small squadron of 
ships with orders to jDroceed southward into the 
Euripus, to meet this detachment whicli the 
Persians sent round ; and, in the mean time, 
they determined themselves to attack the main 
Persian fleet without any delay. Notwithstand- 
ing their absurd dissensions and jealousies, and 
the extent to which the leaders were influenced 
by intrigues and bribes, the Greeks always 
evinced an undaunted and indomitable spirit 
when the day of battle came. It was, more- 
over, in this case, exceedingly important to de- 
fend the position which they had taken. By 
referring to the map once more, it will be seen 
that the Euripus was the great high^vay to 
Athens by sea, as the pass of Thermopyl^ was 
by land. Thermopylae was west of Artemisium, 
where the fleet was now stationed, and not 
many miles from it. The Greek army had 
made its great stand at Thermopylae, and Xerxes 
was fast coming down the country with all 
his forces to endeavor to force a passage there. 
The Persian fleet, in entering Artemisium, was 
making the same attempt by sea in respect to 

* There is reason to suppose that Scyllias made his 
escape by night in a boat, managing the circum- 
stances, however, in such a way as to cause the story 
to be circulated that he swam. 



166 XEKXES. 

the narrow passage of Euripus ; and for either 
of the two forces, the fleet of the army, to fail 
of making good the defense of its position, with- 
out a desperate effort to do so, would justly be 
considered a base betrayal and abandonment of 
the other. 

The Greeks therefore advanced, one morn- 
ing, to the attack of the Persians, to the utter 
astonishment of the latter, who believed that 
their enemies were insane when they thus saw 
them coming into the jaws, as they thought, 
of certain destruction. Before night, however, 
they were to change their opinions in respect to 
the insanity of their foes. The Greeks pushed 
boldly on into the midst of the Persian fleet, 
where they were soon surrounded. They then 
formed themselves into a circle, with the prows 
of the vessels outward, and the sterns toward the 
center within, and fought in this manner with 
the utmost desperation all the day. With the 
night a storm came on, or, rather, a series of 
thunder-showers and gusts of wind, so severe 
that both fleets were glad to retire from the 
scene of contest. The Persians went back to- 
ward the east, the Greeks to the westward, to- 
ward Thermopylas — each party busy in repair- 
ing their wrecks, taking care of their wounded, 
and saving their vessels from the tempest. It 
was a dreadful night. The Persians, particu- 
larly, spent it in the midst of scenes of horror. 



ADVANCE INTO GREECE. 167 

The wind and the current, it seems, set out- 
ward, toward the sea, and carried the masses 
and fragments of the wrecked vessels, and the 
swollen and ghastly bodies of the dead, in among 
the Persian fleet, and so choked up the surface 
of the water that the oars became entangled 
and useless. The whole mass of seamen in the 
Persian fleet, durijig this terrible night, were 
panic-stricken and filled with horror. The 
wind, the perpetual thunder, the concussions 
of the vessel with the wrecks and with one 
another, and the heavy shocks of the seas, kept 
them in continual alarm ; and the black and in- 
scrutable darkness was rendered the more dread- 
ful, while it prevailed, by the hideous spectacle 
which, at every flash of lightning, glared bril- 
liantly npon every eye from the wide surface of 
the sea. The shouts and cries of officers vocif- 
erating orders, of wounded men writhing in 
agony, of watchmen and sentinels in fear of 
collisions, mingled with the howling wind and 
roaring seas, created a scene of indescribable 
terror and confusion. 

The violence of the sudden gale was still 
greater further out at sea, and the detachment 
of ships which had been sent around Euba^a 
was wholly dispersed and destroyed by it. 

The storm was, however, after all, only a se- 
ries of summer evening showers, such a-s to the 
inhabitants of peaceful dwellings on the land 



108 XERXES. 

have no terror^ but only come to clear the sul- 
try atmosphere in the night, and in the morn- 
ing are gone. When the sun rose, accordingly, 
upon the Greeks and Persians on the morning 
after their conflict, the air was calm, the sky 
serene, and the sea as blue and pure as ever. 
The bodies and the wrecks had been floated 
away into the offing. The courage or the fe- 
rocity, whichever we choose to call it, of the 
combatants, returned, and they renewed the 
conflict. It continued, with varying success, 
for two more days. 

During all this time the inhabitants of the 
island of Euboea were in the greatest distress 
and terror. They watched these dreadful con- 
flicts from the heights, uncertain how the 
struggle would end, but fearing lest their de- 
fenders should be beaten, in which case the 
whole force of the Persian fleet would belauded 
on their island, to sweep it with pillage and 
destruction. They soon began to anticipate 
the worst, and, in preparation for it, they re- 
moved their goods — all that could be removed 
— and drove their cattle down to the southern 
part of the island, so as to be ready to escape 
to the main land. The Greek commanders, 
finding that the fleet would probably be com- 
pelled to retreat in the end, sent to them here, 
recommending that they should kill their cattle 
and eat them, roasting the flesh at fires which 



ADVANCE INTO GREECE. 169 

they should kindle on the plain. The cattle 
could not be transported, they said, across the 
channel, and it was better that the flying popu- 
lation should be fed, than that the food should 
fall into Persian hands! If they would dis- 
pose of their cattle in this manner, Eurybiades 
would endeavor, he said, to transport the peo- 
ple themselves and their valuable goods across 
into Attica. 

How many thousand peaceful and happy 
homes were broken up and destroyed forever 
by this ruthless invasion ! 

In tlie meantime, the Persians, irritated by 
the obstinate resistance of the Greeks, were, on 
the fourth day, preparing for some more vigor- 
ous measures, when they saw a small boat com- 
ing toward the fleet from down the channel. 
It proved to contain a countryman, who came 
to tell them that the Greeks had gone away. 
The whole fleet, he said, had sailed oif to the 
southward, and abandoned those seas altogether. 
The Persians did not, at first, believe this in- 
telligence. They suspected some ambuscade 
or stratagem. They advanced slowly and cau- 
tiously down the channel. When they had 
gone half down to Thermopylae, they stopped 
at a place called Histiaea, where, upon the 
rocks on the shore, they found an inscription 
addressed to the lonians — who, it will be recol- 
lected, had been brought by Xerxes as auxil- 



170 XERXES. 

iaries, contrary to the advice of Artabanns — 
entreating them not to fight against their 
countrymen. This inscription was written in 
large and conspicuous characters on the face 
of the cliff, so that it could be read by the 
Ionian seamen as they passed in their galleys. 

The fleet anchored at Histiaea, the command- 
ers being somewhat uncertain in respect to 
what it was best to do. Their suspense was 
very soon relieved by a messenger from Xerxes, 
who came in a galley up the channel from 
Thermopylse, with the news that Xerxes had 
arrived at Thermopylae, had fought a great 
battle there, defeated the Greeks, and obtained 
possession of the pass, and that any of the 
officers of the fleet who chose to do so might 
come and view the battle ground. This intel- 
ligence and invitation produced, throughout 
the fleet, a scene of the wildest excitement, 
enthusiasm, and joy. All the boats and smaller 
vessels of the fleet were put into requisition to 
carry the officers down. When they arrived 
at ThermopylaG the tidings all proved true. 
Xerxes was in possession of the pasS;, and the 
Greek fleet was gone. 




CHAPTER IX. 



THE BATTLE OF THERMOPYLAE. 



The pass of Tliermopylae was not a ravine 
among mountains, but a narrow space be- 
tween mountains and the sea. The mountains 
landward were steep and inaccessible ; the sea 
was shoal. The passage between them was 
narrow for many miles along the shore, being 
narrowest at the ingress and egress. In the 
middle the space was broader. The place was 
celebrated for certain warm springs which here 
issued from the rocks, and which had been 
used in former times for baths. 

The position had been considered, long be- 
fore Xerxes^s day, a very important one in 
a military point of view, as it was upon the 
frontier between two Greek states that were 
frequently at war. One of these states, of 
course, was Thessaly. The other was Phocis, 
which lay south of Thessaly. The general 
boundary between these two states was moun- 
tainous, and impassable for troops, so that 

each could invade the territories of the other 

171 



172 XERXES. 

only by passing round between the mountains 
and the shore at Thermopylae. 

The PhocaeanSj in order to keep the Thessa- 
lians out, had, in former times, built a wall 
across the way, and put up gates there, which 
they strongly fortified. In order still further 
to increase the difficulty of forcing a passage, 
they conducted the water of the warm springs 
over the ground without the wall, in such a 
way as to make the surface continually wet and 
miry. The old wall had now fallen to ruins, 
but the miry ground remained. The place was 
so/itary and desolate, and overgrown with a 
confused and wild vegetation. On one side 
the view extended far and wide over the sea, 
with the highlands of Euboea in the distance, 
and on the other dark and inaccessible moun- 
tains rose, covered with forests, indented with 
mysterious and unexplored ravines, and frown- 
ing in a wild and gloomy majesty over the 
narrow passway which crept along the shore 
below. 

The Greeks, when they retired from Thes- 
saly, fell back upon Thermopylae, and estab- 
lished themselves there. They had a force 
variously estimated, from three to four thou- 
sand men. These were from the different 
states of Greece, some within and some with- 
out the Peloponnesus — a few hundred men 
only being furnished, in general, from each 



THE BATTLE OF THEUMOPYLJC. 178 

state or kingdom. Each of tliese bodies of 
troops had its own officers, tliougli there was 
one general-in-chief, who commanded the 
whole. Tliis was Leonidas the Spartan. He 
had brought with liim three hundred Si:)artans, 
as the cp.iota furnished by that city. Tliese 
men he had specially selected himself, one by 
one, from among the troops of the city, as 
men on Avhom he could rely. 

It will be seen from the map that Thermop- 
ylae is at some distance from the Isthmus of Cor- 
inth, and that of the states which would be pro- 
tected by making a stand at the pass, some were 
without the isthmus and some within. These 
states, in sending each a few hundred men only 
to Thermopylae, did not consider that they were 
making their full contribution to the army, but 
only sending forward for the emergency those 
that could be dispatched at once ; and they were 
all making arrangements to supply more troops 
as soon as they could be raised and equipped for 
the service. In the mean time, however, Xerxes 
and his immense hordes came on faster than 
they had expected, and the news at length came 
to Leonidas, in the pass, that the Persians, with 
one or two millions of men, were at hand, wliile 
he had only three or four thousand at Thermop- 
ylae to oppose them. The question arose, What 
was to be done ? 

Those of the Greeks who came from the Pel 

\o — Xerxes 



174 XERXES. 

oponnesus were in favor of abandoning Ther- 
mopylse^, and falling back to the isthmus. The 
isthmus, they maintained, was as strong and 
as favorable a position as the place where they 
were ; and, by the time they had reached it, 
they would have received great reenforcements ; 
whereas, with so small a force as they had then 
at command, it was madness to attempt to re- 
sist the Persian millions. This plan, however, 
was strongly opposed by all those Greeks who 
represented countries loitliout the Pelopon- 
nesus ; for, by abandoning Tliermopylse, and 
falling back to the isthmus, their states would be 
left wholly at the mercy of the enemy. After 
some consultation and debate, it was decided 
to remain at Thermopylae. The troops accord- 
ingly took up their positions in a deliberate and 
formal manner, and, intrenching themselves as 
strongly as possible, began to await the onset 
of the enemy. Leonidas and his three hundred 
were foremost in the defile, so as to be the first 
exposed to the attack. The rest occupied vari- 
ous positions along the passage, except one 
corps, which was stationed on the mountains 
above, to guard the pass in that direction. 
This corps was from Phocis, which, being the 
state nearest to the scene of conflict, had fur- 
nished a larger number of soldiers than any 
other. Their division numbered a thousand 
men. These being stationed on the declivity 



THE BATTLE OF THERMOPYLAE. 175 

of the mountain, left only two or three thousand 
in the defile below. 

From what has been said of the stern and 
savage character of the Spartans, one would 
scarcely exj^ect in them any indications or dis- 
plays of personal vanity. There was one par- 
ticular, it seems, however, in regard to which 
they were vain, and that was in respect to their 
hair. They wore it very long. In fact, the 
length of the hair was, in their commonwealth, 
a mark of distinction between freemen and 
slaves. All the agricultural and mechanical 
labors were performed, as has already been 
stated, by the slaves, a body which constituted, 
in fact, the mass of the population ; and the 
Spartan freemen, though very stern in their 
manners, and extremely simple and plain in 
their habits of life, were, it must be remembered, 
as proud and lofty in spirit as tliey were plain 
and poor. They constituted a military aris- 
tocracy, and a military aristocracy is always more 
proud and overbearing than any other. 

It must be understood, therefore, that these 
Spartan soldiers were entirely above the per- 
formance of any useful labors ; and while they 
prized, in character, the savage ferocity of the 
tiger, they had a taste, in person, for something 
like his savage beauty too. They were never, 
moreover, more particular and careful in re- 
spect to their personal appearance than when 



176 XERXES. 

Lhcy were going into battle. The field of battle 
was their particular theater of display^ not only 
of the substantial qualities of strength^ for- 
titude, and valor, but also of such personal 
adornments as were consistent with the plain- 
ness and severity of their attire, and could be 
appreciated by a taste as rude and savage as 
theirs. They proceeded, therefore, when es- 
tablished at their post in the throat of the pass, 
to adorn themselves for the approaching battle. 
In the mean time the armies of Xerxes were 
approaching. Xerxes himself, though he did 
not think it possible that the Greeks could have 
a sufficient force to offer him any effectual re- 
sistance, thought it probable that they would 
attempt to make a stand at the pass, and, Avhen 
he began to draw near to it, he sent forward a 
horseman to reconnoiter the ground. The 
horseman rode into the pass a little way, until 
he came in sight of the enemy. He stopped 
upon an eminence to survey the scene, being all 
ready to turn in an instant, and fly at the top 
of his speed, in case he should be pursued. 
The Spartans looked upon him as he stood there, 
but seemed to consider his appearance as a cir- 
cumstance of no moment, and then went on 
with their avocations. The horseman found, as 
he leisurely observed them, that there was an 
intrenchment thrown across the straits, and 
that the Spartans were in front of it. There 



THE BATTLE OF THEKMOPYL.E. 177 

were other forces behind ; but these the horse- 
man could not see. The Sj^artans were engaged, 
some of them in athletic sports and gymnastic 
exercises, and the rest in nicely arranging their 
dress, which was red and showy in color, though 
simple and plain in form, and in smoothing, 
adjusting, and curling their hair. In fact, 
they seemed to be, one and all, preparing for 
an entertainment. 

And yet these men were actually preparing 
themselves to be slaughtered, to be butchered, 
one by one, by slow degrees, and in the most 
horrible and cruel manner ; and they knew per- 
fectly well that it was so. The adorning of them- 
selves was for this express and particular end. 

The horseman, when he had attentively noticed 
all that was to be seen, rode slowly back to 
Xerxes, and reported the result. The king was 
much amused at hearing such an account from 
his messenger. He sent for Demaratus, the 
Spartan refugee, with whom, the reader ^vill 
recollect, he held a long conversation in respect 
to the Greeks at the close of the great review 
at Doriscus. AVhen Demaratus came, Xerxes 
related to him what the' messenger had re- 
ported. ^^The Spartans in the pass," said he, 
''present, in their encampment, the appear- 
ance of being out on a party of pleasure. 
What does it mean ? You will admit now, I 
suppose, that they do not intend to resist us.'* 



178 XERXES. 

Demaratus shook his head. " Your Majesty 
does not know the Greeks/^ said he, " and I am 
very much afraid that, if I state what I know 
respecting them, I shall offend you. These ap- 
pearances which your messenger observed indi- 
cate to me that the men he saw were a body of 
Spartans, and that they supposed themselves on 
the eve of a desperate conflict. Those are the 
men, practising athletic feats, and smoothing 
and adorning their hair, that are the most to be 
feared of all the soldiers of Greece. If you can 
conquer them, you will" have nothing beyond 
to fear." 

Xerxes thought this opinion of Demaratus 
extremely absurd. He was convinced that the 
party in the pass was some small detachment 
that could ]iot possibly be thinking of serious 
resistance. They would, he was satisfied, now 
that they found that the Persians were at hand, 
immediately retire down the pass, and leave the 
way clear. He advanced, therefore, up to the 
entrance of the pass, encamped there, and 
waited several days for the Greeks to clear the 
way. The Greeks remained quietly in their 
places, paying apparently no attention, whatever 
to the impending and threatening presence of 
their formidable foes. 

At length Xerxes concluded that it was time 
for him to act. On the morning, therefore, of 
the fifth day, he called out a detachment of his 



THE BATTLE OF TllEKMOPYL.E. 179 

troops, sufficient, as lie tliouglit, for the pur- 
pose, and sent them down the pass, with orders 
to seize all the Greeks that were there, and 
bring them, alive, to him. The detachment 
that he sent was a body of xMedes, who were 
considered as the best troops in the army, ex- 
cepting always the Immortals, who, as has been 
before stated, were entirely superior to the rest. 
The ]\Iedes, however, Xerxes supposed, would 
find no difficulty in executing his orders. 

The detachment marched, accordingly, into 
•the pass. In a few hours a spent and breath- 
less messenger came from them, asking for re- 
enforcements. The reenforcements were sent. 
Toward night a remnant of the whole body 
came back, faint and exhausted with a long 
and fruitless combat, and bringing many of 
their wounded and bleeding comrades w^ith 
them. The rest they had left dead in the de- 
file. 

Xerxes was both astonished and enraged at 
these results. He determined that this trifling 
should continue no longer. He ordered the Im- 
mortals themselves to be called out on the 
following morning, and then placing himself 
at the head of them, he advanced to the vicin- 
nity of the Greek intrenchments. Here he 
ordered a seat or throne to be placed for him 
upon an eminence, and, taking his seat upon it, 
prepared to witness the conflict. The Greeks, 



ISO XERXEg. 

in the mean time, calmly arranged themselves 
on the line which they had undertaken to 
defend, and awaited the charge. npon the 
ground, on every side, were lying the mangled 
bodies of the Persians slain the day before, 
some exposed fully to view, ghastly and horrid 
spectacles, others trampled down and half 
buried in the mire. 

The Immortals advanced to the attack, but 
they made no impression. Their superior num- 
bers gave them no advantage, on account of the 
narrowness of the defile. The Greeks stood, 
each corps at its own assigned station on the 
line, forming a mass so firm and immovable that 
the charge of the Persians was arrested on en- 
countering it as by a wall. In fact, as the spears 
of the Greeks were longer than those of the Per- 
sians, and their muscular and athletic strength 
and skill were greater, it was found that in the 
desperate conflict which raged, hour after hour, 
along the line, the Persians were continually 
falling, while the Greek ranks continued entire. 
Sometimes the Greeks would retire for a space, 
falling back with the utmost coolness, regular- 
ity, and order ; and then, when the Persians 
pressed on in pursuit, supposing that they were 
gaining the victory, the Greeks would turn so 
soon as they found that the order of pursuit had 
thrown the enemies' lines somewhat into confu- 
sion, and, presenting the same firm and terrible 



THE BATTLE OF THEKMOPYLvE. 181 

front as before, would press again upon the of- 
fensive, and cut down their enemies with re- 
doubled slaughter. Xerxes, who witnessed all 
these things from among the group of officers 
around him upon the eminence, was kept con- 
tinually in a state of excitement and irritation. 
Three times he leaped from his throne, with 
loud exclamations of vexation and rage. 

All, however, was of no avail. When night 
came the Immortals were compelled to with- 
draw, and leave the Greeks in possession of 
their intrenchments. 

Things continued substantially in this state 
for one or two days longer, when one morning 
a Greek countryman appeared at the tent of 
Xerxes, and asked an audience of the king. 
He had something, he said, of great importance 
to communicate to him. The king ordered him 
to be admitted. The Greek said that his name 
was Ephialtes, and that he came to inform the 
king that there was a secret path leading along 
a wild and hidden chasm in the mountains, by 
which he could guide a body of Persians to the 
summit of the hills overhanging the pass at a 
point below the Greek intrenchment. This 
point being once attained, it would be easy, 
Ephialtes said, for the Persian forces to descend 
into the pass below the Greeks, and thus to sur- 
round them and shut them in, and that the con- 
quest of them would then be easy. The path 



182 XERXES. 

was a secret one, and known to very few. He 
knew it, however, and was willing to conduct a 
detachment of troops through it, on condition 
of receiving a suitable reward. 

The king was greatly surprised and delighted 
at this intelligence. He immediatel acceded 
to Ephialtes's proposals, and organized a strong 
force to be sent up the path that very night. 

On the north of Thermopylae there was a 
small stream, which came down through a 
chasm in the mountains to the sea. The path 
which Ephialtes was to show commenced here, 
and following the bed of this stream up the 
chasm, it at length turned to the southward 
through a succession of wild and trackless ra- 
vines, till it came out at last on the declivities of 
the mountains near the lower part of the pass, 
at a place where it was possible to descend to 
the defile below. This was the point which the 
thousand Phocseans had been ordered to take 
possession of and guard, when the plan for the 
defense of the pass was first organized. They 
were posted here, not with the idea of repelling 
any attack from the mountains behind them — 
for the existence of the path was wholly un- 
known to them — but only that they might com- 
mand the defile below, and aid in preventing the 
Persians from going through, even if those who 
were in the defile were defeated or slain. 

The Persian detachment toiled all night up 



THE BATTLE OF THERM0PYLJ3. 183 

the steep and dangerous pathway, among rocks, 
chasms, and precipices, frightful by day, and 
now made still more frightful by the gloom of 
the night. They came out at last, in the dawn 
of the morning, into valleys and glens high up 
the declivity of the mountain, and in the imme- 
diate vicinity of the Phoccean encampment. 
The Persians were concealed, as they advanced, 
by the groves and thickets of stunted oaks which 
grew here, but the morning air was so calm 
and still, that the Phocaean sentinels heard the 
noise made by their trampling upon the leaves 
as they came up the glen. The Phocaeans im- 
mediately gave the alarm. Both parties were 
completely surprised. The Persians had not 
expected to find a foe at this elevation, and the 
Greeks who had ascended there had supposed 
that all beyond and above them was an impass- 
able and trackless desolation. 

There was a short conflict. The Phocaeans 
were driven off their ground. They retreated 
up the mountain, and toward the southward. 
The Persians decided not to pursue them. 
On the other hand, they descended toward the 
defile, and took up a position on the lower de- 
clivities of the mountain, which enabled them 
to command the pass below : there they paused, 
and awaited Xerxes's orders. 

The Greeks in the defile perceived at once 
that thev were now wholly at the mercy of their 



184 XERXES. 

enemies. They might yet retreat, it is true, 
for the Persian detachment had not yet de- 
scended to intercept them ; but, if they re- 
mained where they were, they would, in a few 
hours, be hemmed in by their foes ; and even 
if they could resist, for a little time, the doubl© 
onset which would then be made upon them, 
their supplies would be cut off, and there would 
be nothing before them but immediate starva- 
tion. They held hurried councils to determine 
what to do. 

There is some doubt as to what took place at 
these councils, though the prevailing testimony 
is, that Leonidas recommended that they should 
retire — that is, that all except himself and the 
three hundred Spartans should do so. " You,"* 
said he, addressing the other Greeks, '''are at 
liberty, by your laws, to consider, in such casea 
as this, the question of expediency, and to with- 
draw from a position which you have taken, or 
stand and maintain it, according as you judge 
best. But by our laws, such a question, in such 
a case, is not to be entertained. Wherever we 
are posted, there we stand, come life or death, 
to the end. We have been sent here from 
Sparta to defend the pass of Thermopylae. 
We have received no orders to withdraw. 
Here, therefore, we must remain ; and the 
Persians, if they go through the pass at all, 
must go through it over our graves. It is. 



THE BATTLE OF THERMOPYL^. 185 

therefore, your duty to retire. Our duty is 
here, and we will remain and do it/' 

After all that may be said of the absurdity 
and folly of throwing away the lives of three 
hundred men in a case like this, so utterly and 
hopelessly desperate, there is still something in 
the noble generosity with which Leonidas dis- 
missed the other Greeks, and in the undaunted 
resolution with which he determined himself to 
maintain his ground, which has always strongly 
excited the admiration of mankind. It was un- 
doubtedly carrying the point of honor to a 
wholly unjustifiable extreme, and yet all the 
world, for the twenty centuries which have 
intervened since those transactions occurred, 
while they have unanimously disapproved, in 
theory, of the course which Leonidas pursued, 
have none the less unanimously admired and 
applauded it. 

In dismissing the other Greeks, Leonidas re- 
tained with him a body of Thebans, whom he 
suspected of a design of revolting to the enemy. 
^\ hether he considered his decision to keep them 
in the pass equivalent to a sentence of death, 
and intended it as a punishment for their sup- 
posed treason, or only that he wished to secure 
their continued fidelity by keeping them closely 
to their duty, does not appear. At all events, 
he retained them, and dismissed the otlier allies. 
Those dismissed retreated to the open country 



186 XERXES. 

below. The Spartans and the Thebans remained 
in the pass. There were also, it was said, some 
other troops, who, not willing to leave the 
Spartans alone in this danger, chose to remain 
with them and share their fate. The Thebans 
remained very unwillingly. 

The next morning Xerxes prepared for his 
final effort. He began by solemn religious 
services, in the presence of his army, at an early 
hour ; and then, after breakfasting quietly, as 
usual, and waiting, in fact, until the business 
part of the day had arrived, he gave orders to 
advance. His troops found Leonidas and his 
party not at their intrenchments, as before, 
but far in advance of them. They had come 
out and forward into a more open part of the 
defile, as if to court and anticipate their inevi- 
table and dreaded fate. Here a most terrible 
combat ensued ; one which, for a time, seemed 
to have no other object than mutual destruction, 
until at length Leonidas himself fell, and then 
the contest for the possession of his body su- 
perseded the unthinking and desperate strug- 
gles of mere hatred and rage. Four times the 
body, having been taken by the Persians, was 
retaken by the Greeks; at last the latter re- 
treated, bearing the dead body with them past 
their intrenchment, until they gained a small 
eminence in the rear of it, at a point where the 
pass was wider. Here the few that were still 



THE BATTLE OF THERMOPYL^. 187 

left gathered together. The detachment which 
Ephialtes had guided were coming up from be- 
low. The Spartans were faint and exhausted 
with their desperate efforts, and were bleeding 
from the wounds they had received ; their 
swords and spears were broken to pieces, their 
leader and nearly all their company were slain. 
But the savage and tiger-like ferocity which ani- 
mated them continued unabated till the last. 
They fought with tooth and nail when all 
other weapons failed them, and bit the dust at 
last, as they fell, in convulsive and unyielding 
despair. The struggle did not cease till they 
were all slain, and every limb of every man 
ceased to quiver. 

There were stories in circulation among man- 
kind after this battle, importing that one or 
two of the corps escaped the fate of the rest. 
There were two soldiers, it was said, that had 
been left in a town near the pass, as invalids, 
being afflicted with a severe inflammation of 
the eyes. One of them, when he heard that the 
Spartans were to be left in the pass, went in, of 
his own accord, and joined them, choosing to 
share the fate of his comrades. It was said 
that he ordered his servant to conduct him to 
the place. The servant did so, and then fled, 
himself, in great terror. The sick soldier re- 
mained and fought with the rest. The other 
of the invalids was saved, but, on his return to 

14— Xerxes 



188 XERXES. 

Sparta, ho was considered as stained with in- 
delible disgrace for what his countrymen re- 
garded a base dereliction from duty in not shar- 
ing his comrade's fate. 

There was also a story of another man, wlio 
had been sent away on some mission into Thes- 
saly, and who did not return nntil all was over ; 
and also of two others who had been sent to 
Sparta, and were returning when they heard of 
the approaching conflict. One of them hast- 
ened into the pass, and was killed with his 
companions. The other delayed, and was saved. 
Whether any or all of these rumors were true, 
is not now certain ; there is, however, no doubt 
that, with at most a few exceptions such as 
these, the whole three hundred were slain. 

The Thebans, early in the conflict, went over 
in a body to the enemy. 

Xerxes came after the battle to view the 
ground. It ^vas covered with many thousands 
of dead bodies, nearly all of whom, of course, 
were Persians. The wall of the intrenchment 
was broken down, and the breaches in it choked 
up by the bodies. The morasses made by the 
water of the springs were trampled into dee]) 
mire, and were full of the mutilated forms of 
men and of broken weapons. When Xerxes 
came at last to the body of Leonidas, and was 
told that that was the man who had been the 
leader of the band, he gloried over it in great 



THE RATTLE OF THERMOPVL^. 189 

exultation and triiinipli. At length he ord(3rcd 
the body to bo decapitated, and the headless 
trunk to bo nailed to a cross. 

Xerxes then commanded that a great hole 
should be dug, and ordered all tlie bodies of tlie 
Persians that had been killed to be buried in it, 
except only about a thousand, which he left 
upon the ground. The object of this was to 
conceal the extent of the loss which his army 
had sustained. The more perfectly to accom- 
plish this end, he caused the great grave, when 
it was filled uji, to be strewed over with leaves, 
so as to cover and conceal all indications of 
wliat had been done. This having been care- 
fully effected, he sent the message to the fleet, 
which was alluded to at the close of the last 
chapter, inviting the officers to come and view 
the ground. 

The operations of the fleet described in the 
last chapter, and those of the army narrated in 
this, took place, it will be remembered, at the 
same time, and in the same vicinity too ; for, 
by referring to the map, it will appear that 
Thermopylae was upon the coast, exactly op- 
posite to the channel or arm of the sea lying 
north of Eubo3a, where the naval contests had 
been waged ; so that, while Xerxes had been 
making his desperate efforts to get through the 
pass, his fleet had been engaged in a similar 
conflict with the squadrons of the Greeks, 



190 XERXES. 

directly opposite to him, twenty or thirty miles 
in the offing. 

After the battle of Thermopylae was over^, 
Xerxes sent for Demaratns, and inquired of 
him how many more snch soldiers there were in 
Greece as Leonidas and his three hundred Spar- 
tans. Demaratus replied that he could not say 
how many precisely there were in Greece, but 
that there were eight thousand such in Sparta 
alone. Xerxes then asked the opinion of 
Demaratus as to the course best to be pursued 
for making the conquest of the country. This 
conversation was held in the presence of various 
nobles and officers, among whom was the ad- 
miral of the fleet, who had come, with the vari- 
ous other naval commanders, as was stated in 
the last chapter, to view the battle-field. 

Demaratus said that he did not think that 
the king could easily get possession of the Pel- 
oponnesus by marching to it directly, so formi- 
dable would be the opposition that he would 
encounter at the isthmus. There was, however, 
he said, an island called Cythera, opposite to 
the territories of Sparta, and not far from the 
shore, of which he thought that the king could 
easily get possession, and which, once fully in 
his power, might be made the base of future 
operations for the reduction of the whole pen- 
insula, as bodies of troops could be despatched 
from it to the main land in any numbers and at 



THE BATTLE OF THERMOPYL^. 191 

any time. He recommended, therefore, tliat 
three hundred ships, with a proper complement 
of men, should be detached from tlie fleet, and 
sent round at once to take possession of that 
island. 

To this plan the admiral of the fleet was to- 
tally opposed. It was natural that he should 
be so, since the detaching of three hundred 
ships for this enterprise would greatly weaken 
the force under his command. It would leave 
the fleet, he told the king, a miserable remnant, 
not superior to that of the enemy, for they had 
already lost four hundred ships by storms. He 
thought it infinitely preferable that the fleet and 
the army should advance together, the one by 
sea and the other on the land, and complete 
their conquests as they went along. He advised 
the king, too, to beware of Demaratus's advice. 
He was a Greek, and, as such, his object was, 
the admiral believed, to betray and ruin the 
expedition. 

After hearing these conflicting opinions, the 
king decided to follow the admiral's advice. 
^^ I will adopt your counsel,''^ said he, " but I 
will not hear anything said against Demaratus, 
for I am convinced that he is a true and faithful 
friend to me." Saying this, he dismissed the 
council. 




CHAPTER X. 



THE BURKIJs^G OF ATHENS. 



WHEi^ the officers of the Persian fleet had 
satisfied themselves with examining the battle- 
field at Thermopylae, and had heard the narra- 
tions given by the soldiers of the terrible com- 
bats that had been fonght with the desperate 
garrison which had been stationed to defend 
the pass, they went back to their vessels, and 
prepared to make sail to the southward, in pur- 
suit of the Greek fleet. The Greek fleet had 
gone to Salamis. The Persians in due time 
overtook them there, and a great naval con- 
flict occurred, which is known in history as 
the battle of Salamis, and was one of the most 
celebrated naval battles of ancient times. An 
account of this battle will form the subject of 
the next chapter. In this we are to follow the 
operations of the army on the land. 

As the Pass of Thermopylae was now in 

Xerxes's possession, the way was open before 

him to all that portion of the great territory 

which lay north of the Peloponnesus. Of 

course, before he could enter the peninsula 
192 



THE BURNING OF ATHENS. 193 

itself, he must joass the Isthmus of Corinth, 
where he niiglit, perhaps, encounter some con- 
centrated resistance. North of the isthmus, 
however, there was no place where the Greeks 
could make a stand. The country was all open, 
or, rather, there were a thousand ways open 
through the various valleys and glens, and along 
the banks of the rivers. All that was neces- 
sary was to procure guides and proceed. 

The Thessalians were very ready to furnish 
guides. They had submitted to Xerxes before 
the battle of Thermopylae, as they considered 
themselves, accordingly, as his allies. They 
had, besides, a special interest in conducting 
the Persian army, on account of the hostile feel- 
ings which they entertained toward the people 
immediately south of the pass, into whose ter- 
ritories Xerxes would first carry his ravages. 
This people were the Phocaeans. Their coun- 
try, as has already been stated, was separated 
from Thessaly by impassable mountains, except 
where the Straits of Thermopylae opened a pas- 
sage ; and through this pass both nations had 
been continually making hostile incursions into 
the territory of the other for many years before 
the Persian invasion. The Thessalians had 
surrendered readily to the summons of Xerxes, 
while the Phocaeans had determined to resist 
him, and adhere to the cause of the Greeks in 
the struggle. They were suspected of having 



194 XERXES. 

been influenced, in a great measure, in their de- 
termination to resist, by the fact that the Thes- 
salians had decided to surrender. They were 
resolved that they would not, on any account, 
be upon the same side with their ancient and 
inveterate foes. 

The hostility of the Thessalians to the Pho- 
caeans was equally implacable. At the last in- 
cursion which they had made into the Phocagan 
territory, they had been defeated by means of 
stratagems in a manner which tended greatly 
to vex and irritate them. There were two of 
these stratagems, which were both completely 
successful, and both of a very extraordinary 
character. 

The first was this. The Thessalians were in 
the Phocaean country in great force, and the 
Phocseans had found themselves utterly unable 
to expel them. Under these circumstances, a 
body of the Phocseans, six hundred in number, 
one day whitened their faces, their arms and 
hands, their clothes, and all their weapons, with 
chalk, and then, at the dead of night — perhaps, 
however, when the moon was shining — made 
an onset upon the camp of the enemy. The 
Thessalian sentinels were terrified and ran away, 
and the soldiers, awakened from their slumbers 
by these unearthly-looking troops, screamed 
with fright, and fled in all directions, in utter 
confusion and dismay. A night attack is usu- 



THE BURNING OF ATHENS. 195 

ally II diiiigcruus atieiii^^t, even if the assault- 
ing party is the strongest, as, in the darkness 
and confusion which then prevail, the assailants 
cannot ordinarily distinguish friends from foes, 
and so are in great danger, amid tlie tumult 
and obscurit}^ of slaying one another. That 
difficulty Avas obviated in this case by the 
strange disguise which the Phoceeans had as- 
sumed. They knew that all were Tliessalians 
who were not whitened like themselves. The 
Thessalians were totally discomfited and dis- 
persed by this encounter. 

The other stratagem was of a different char- 
acter, and was directed against a troop of cav- 
alry. The Thessalian cavalry were renowned 
throughout the world. The broad plains ex- 
tending through the heart of their country 
contained excellent fields for training and 
exercising such troops, and the mountains 
which surrounded it furnished grassy slopes 
and verdant valleys, that supplied excellent 
pasturage for the rearing of horses. The na- 
tion was very strong, therefore, in this species 
of force, and many of the states and kingdoms 
of Greece, when planning their means of in- 
ternal defense, and potentates and conquerors, 
when going forth on great campaigns, often 
considered their armies incomplete unless there 
was included in them a corps of Thessalian 
cavalry. 



196 XERXES. 

A troop of tliis cavalry had invaded Phocis, 
and the Phocseans, conscious of their inability 
to resist them in open war, contrived to entrap 
them in the following manner. They dug a 
long trench in the ground, and then putting in 
baskets or casks sufficient nearly to fill the 
space, they spread over the top a thin layer of 
soil. They then concealed all indications that 
the ground had been disturbed, by spreading 
leaves over the surface. The trap being thus 
prepared, they contrived to entice the Thes- 
salians to the spot by a series of retreats, and at 
length led them into the pitfall thus provided 
for them. The substructure of casks was 
strong enough to sustain the Phocseans, who 
went over it as footmen, but was too fragile to 
bear the weight of the mounted troops. The 
horses broke through, and the squadron was 
thrown into such confusion by so unexpected 
a disaster, that, when the Phocseans turned and 
fell upon them, they were easily overcome. 

These things had irritated and vexed the 
Thessalians very much. They were eager for 
revenge, and they were very ready to guide the 
armies of Xerxes into the country of their ene- 
mies in order to obtain it. 

The troops advanced accordingly, awakening 
everywhere, as they came on, the greatest con- 
sternation and terror among the inhabitants, 
and producing on all sides scenes of indescrib- 



THE BURNING OF ATHP^NS. 197 

able anguish and suffering. They came into 
the valley of the Cephisus, a beautiful river 
flowing through a delightful and fertile region, 
which contained many cities and towns, and 
was filled everywhere with an industrious rural 
population. Through this scene of peace, and 
happiness, and plenty, the vast horde of in- 
vaders swept on with the destructive force of a 
tornado. They plundered the towns of every- 
thing which could be carried away, and de- 
stroyed what they were compelled to leave 
behind them. There is a catalogue of twelve 
cities in this valley which they burned. The 
inhabitants, too, were treated with the utmost 
cruelty. Some were seized, and compelled to 
follow the army as slaves ; others were slain ; 
and others still were subjected to nameless 
cruelties and atrocities, worse sometimes than 
death. Many of the women, both mothers and 
maidens, died in consequence of the brutal 
violence with which the soldiers treated them. 

The most remarkable of the transactions 
connected Avith Xerxes's advance through the 
country of Phocis, on his way to Athens, were 
those connected with his attack upon Delphi. 
Delphi was a sacred town, the seat of the oracle. 
It was in the vicinity of Mount Parnassus and 
of the Castalian spring, places of very great 
renown in the Greek mythology. 

Parnassus was the name of a short moun- 



198 XERXES. 

tainous range ratlier tlian of a single peak, 
though the loftiest summit of the range was 
called Parnassus too. This summit is found, 
by modern measurement, to be about eight 
thousand feet high, and it is covered with 
snow nearly all the year. When bare it consists 
only of a desolate range of rocks, with mosses 
and a few Alpine plants growing on the shel- 
tered and sunny sides of them. From the top 
of Parnassus travelers who now. visit it look 
down upon almost all of Greece as upon a 
map. The Gulf of Corinth is a silver lake at 
their feet, and the plains of Thessaly are seen 
extending far and wide to the northward, with 
Olympus, Pelion, and Ossa, blue and distant 
peaks, bounding the view. 

Parnassus has, in fact, a double summit, be- 
tween the peaks of which a sort of ravine com- 
mences, which, as it extends down the moun- 
tain, becomes a beautiful valley, shaded with 
rows of trees, and adorned with slopes of verd- 
ure and banks of flowers. In a glen connected 
with this valley there is a fountain of water 
springing copiously from among the rocks, in a 
grove of laurels. This fountain gives rise to a 
stream, which, after bounding over the rocks, 
and meandering between mossy banks for a long 
distance down the mountain glens, becomes 
a quiet low^land stream, and flows gently through 
a fertile and undulating country to tlie sea. 



THE BURNING OF ATHENS. 199 

This fountain was the famous Castalian spring. 
It was, as the ancient Greek legends said, the 
favorite resort and residence of Apollo and the 
Muses, and its waters became, accordingly, the 
symbol and the emblem of poetical inspira- 
tion. 

The city of Delphi was built upon the lower 
declivities of the Parnassian ranges, and yet 
high above the surrounding country. It was 
built in the form of an amphitheater, in a sort 
of lap in the hill where it stood, with steep prec- 
ipices descending to a great depth on either side. 
It was thus a position of difficult access, and 
was considered almost impregnable in respect 
to its military strength. Besides its natural 
defenses,it was considered as under the special 
protection of Apollo. 

Delphi was celebrated throughout the world, 
in ancient times, not only for the oracle itself, 
but for the magnificence of the architectural 
structures, the boundless profusion of the works 
of art, and the immense value of the treasures 
which, in process of time, had been accumulated 
there. The various 2:)0wers and potentates that 
had resorted to it to obtain the responses of the 
oracle, had brought rich presents, or made 
costly contributions in some way, to the service 
of the shrine. Some had built temples, others 
had constructed porches or colonnades. Some 
had adorned the streets of the city with arclii- 



200 XERXES. 

tectnral embellishments ; others had caused 
statues to be erected ; and others had made 
splendid donations of vessels of gold and silver, 
until at length the wealth and magnificence of 
Delphi was the wonder of the world. All na- 
tions resorted to it, some to see its splendors, 
and others to obtain the counsel and direction 
of the oracle in emergencies of difficulty or 
danger. 

In the time of Xerxes, Delphi had been for 
several hundred years in the enjoyment of its 
fame as a place of divine inspiration. It was 
said to have been originally discovered in the 
following manner. Some herdsmen on the 
mountains, watching their flocks, observed one 
day a number of goats performing very strange 
and unaccountable antics among some crevices 
in the rocks, and, going to the place, they found 
that a mysterious wind was issuing from the 
crevices, which produced an extraordinary ex- 
hilaration on all who breathed it. Everything 
extraordinary was thought, in those days, to be 
supernatural and divine, and the fame of this 
discovery was spread everywhere, the people 
supposing that the effect produced upon the 
men and animals by breathing the mysterious 
air was a divine inspiration. A temple was 
built over the spot, priests and priestesses were 
installed, a city began to rise, and in process of 
time Delphi become the most celebrated oracle 



THE BURNING OF ATHENS. 201 

in the world ; and as the vast treasures which 
had been accumuhited there consisted mainly 
of gifts and offerings consecrated to a divine and 
sacred service, they were all understood to be 
under divine protection. They were defended, 
it is true, in part by the inaccessibleness of the 
position of Delphi, and by the artificial fortifica- 
tions which had been added from time to time 
to increase the security, but still more by the 
feeling which everywhere prevailed, that any 
violence offered to such a shrine would be pun- 
ished by the gods as sacrilege. The account of 
the manner in which Xerxes was repulsed, as 
related by the ancient historians, is somewhat 
marvelous. We, however, in this case, as in all 
others, transmit the story to our readers as the 
ancient historians give it to us. 

The main body of the army pursued its way 
directly southward toward the city of Athens, 
which was now the great object at which Xerxes 
aimed. A large detachment, however, sepa- 
rating from the main body, moved more to the 
westward, toward Delphi. Their plan was to 
plunder the temples and the city, and send the 
treasures to the king. The Delphians, on hear- 
ing this, were seized with consternation. They 
made application themselves to the oracle, to 
know what they were to do in respect to the sa- 
cred treasures. They could not defend them, 
they said, against such a host, and they inquired 



202 XERXES. 

whether they should bury them in the earth, or 
attempt to remove them to some distant place 
of safety. 

The oracle replied that they were to do noth- 
ing at all in respect to the sacred treasures. The 
divinity, it said, was able to protect what was its 
own. They, on their part, had only to provide 
for themselves, their wives, and their children. 

On hearing this response, the people dismissed 
all care in respect to the treasures pt the tem- 
ple and of the shrine, and made arrangements 
for removing their families and their own effects 
to some place of safety toward the southward. 
The military force of the city and a small 
number of the inhabitants alone remained. 

When the Persians began to draw near, a 
prodigy occurred in the temple, which seemed 
intended to warn the profane invaders away. 
It seems that there was a suit of arms, of a 
costly character doubtless, and highly decorated 
with gold and gems — the present, probably, of 
some Grecian state or king — which were hung 
in an inner and sacred apartment of the temple, 
and which it was sacrilegious for any human 
hand to touch. These arms were found, on the 
day when the Persians were approaching, re- 
moved to the outward front of the temple. The 
priest who first observed them was struck with 
amazement and awe. He spread the intelli- 
gence among the soldiers and the people that 



THE BURNING OF ATHENS. 203 

remained, and the circumstance awakened in 
them great animation and courage. 

Nor were the hopes of divine interposition 
which this wonder awakened disappointed in 
the end ; for, as soon as the detachment of Per- 
sians came near the hill on which Delphi was 
situated, loud thunder burst from the sky, and 
a bolt, descending upon the precipices near the 
town, detached two enormous masses of rock, 
which rolled down upon the ranks of the in- 
vaders. The Delphian soldiers, taking advan- 
tage of the scene of panic and confusion which 
this awful visitation produced, rushed down up- 
on their enemies and completed their dis- 
comfiture. They were led on and assisted in 
this attack by the spirits of two ancient heroes, 
who had been natives of the country, and to 
whom two of the temples of Delphi had been 
consecrated. These spirits appeared in the form 
of tall and full-armed warrioi's, who led the 
attack, and performed prodigies of strength 
and valor in the onset upon the Persians ; and 
then, when the battle was over, disappeared 
as mysteriously as they came. 

In the mean time the great body of the army 
of Xerxes, with the monarch at their head, was 
advancing on Athens. During his advance the 
city had been in a continual state of panic and 
confusion. In the first place, when the Greek 
fleet had concluded to give up the contest in the 



204 XERXES. 

Artemisian Channel, before the battle of Ther- 
mopylae, and had passed around to Salamis, the 
commanders in the city of Athens had given up 
the hope of making any effectual defense, and 
had given orders that the inhabitants should 
save themselves by seeking a refuge wherever 
they could find it. This annunciation, of 
course, filled the city with dismay, and the 
preparations for a general flight opened every- 
where scenes of terror and distress, of which 
those who have never witnessed the evacuation 
of a city by its inhabitants can scarcely con- 
ceive. 

The immediate object of the general terror 
was, at this time, the Persian fleet ; for the 
Greek fleet, having determined to abandon the 
waters on that side of Attica, left the whole 
coast exposed, and the Persians might be ex- 
pected at any hour to make a landing within a 
few miles of the city. Scarcely, however, had 
the impending of this danger been made known 
to the city, before the tidings of one still more 
imminent reached it, in the news that the Pass 
of Thermopylae had been carried, and that in 
addition to the peril with which the Athenians 
were threatened by the fleet on the side of the 
sea, the whole Persian army was coming down 
upon them by land. This fresh alarm greatly 
increased, of course, the general consternation. 
All the roads leading from the city toward the 



THE BUKNING OF ATHENS. 205 

south and west were soon covered with parties 
of wretched fugitives^ exhibiting as they pressed 
forward, weary and wayworn, on their toilsome 
and almost hopeless flight, every ]30ssible phase 
of misery, destitution, and despair. The army 
fell back to the isthmus, intending to make 
a stand, if possible, there, to defend the Pel- 
oponnesus. The fugitives made the best of 
their way to the sea-coast, where they were re- 
ceived on board transjDort ships sent thither 
from the fleet, and conveyed, some to Egina, 
some to Salamis, and others to other points on 
tlie coasts and islands to the south, wherever 
the terrified exiles thought there was the best 
prospect of safety. 

Some, however, remained at Athens. There 
was a part of the population who believed that 
the phrase *^ wooden walls, '^ used by the oracle, 
referred, not to the ships of the fleet, but to 
the wooden palisade around the citadel. They 
accordingly repaired and strengthened the pali- 
sade, and established themselves in the fortress 
with a small garrison which undertook to de- 
fend it. 

The citadel of Athens, or the Acropolis, as 
it was called, was the richest, and most splen- 
did, and magnificent fortress in the world. It 
was built upon an oblong rocky hill, the sides 
of which were perpendicular cliffs, except at 
one end, where alone the summit was acces- 



206 XERXES, 

sible. This summit presented an area of an 
oval form, about a thousand feet in length and 
five hundred broad, thus containing a space of 
about ten acres. This area upon the summit, 
and also the approaches at the western end, 
were covered with the most grand, imposing, 
and costly architectural structures that then 
existed in the whole European world. There 
were temples, colonnades, gateways, stairways, 
porticoes, towers, and walls, which, viewed as 
a whole, presented a most magnificent spec- 
tacle, that excited universal admiration, and 
which, when examined in detail, awakened a 
greater degree of wonder still by the costliness 
of the materials, the beauty and perfection of 
the workmanship, and the richness and pro- 
fusion of the decorations, which were seen on 
every hand. The number and variety of stat- 
ues of bronze and of marble which had been 
erected in the various temples and upon the 
different platforms were very great. There 
was one, a statue of Minerva, which was exe- 
cuted by Phidias, the great Athenian sculptor, 
after the celebrated battle of Marathon, in the 
days of Darius, which, with its pedestal, was 
sixty feet high. It stood on the left of the 
grand entrance, towering above the buildings 
in full view from the country below, and lean- 
ing upon its long spear like a colossal sentinel 
on guard. In the distance, on the right, from 



THE BURNING OF ATHENS. 207 

the same point of view, the great temple called 
the Parthenon was to be seen, a temple, which 
was, in some respects, the most celebrated in 
the world. The ruins of these edifices remain 
to the present day, standing in desolate and 
solitary grandeur on the rocky hill which they 
once so richly adorned. 

When Xerxes arrived at Athens, he found, 
of course, no difficulty in obtaining possession 
of the city itself, since it had been deserted by 
its inhabitants, and left defenseless. The peo- 
ple that remained had all crowded into the cit- 
adel. They . had built the wooden palisade 
across the only approach by which it was pos- 
sible to get near the gates, and they had col- 
lected large stones on the tops of the rocks, to 
roll down upon their assailants if they should 
attempt to ascend. 

Xerxes, after ravaging and burning the town, 
took up a position upon a hill opposite to the 
citadel, and there he had engines constructed 
to throw enormous arrows, on which tow that 
had been dipped in pitch was wound. This 
combustible envelopment of the arrows was set 
on fire before the weapon was discharged, and 
a shower of the burning missiles thus formed 
was directed toward the palisade. The wooden 
walls were soon set on fire by them, and totally 
consumed. The access to the Acropolis was, 
however, still difficult, being by a steep ac- 



208 XERXES. 

ity, up which it was very dangerous to as- 
cend so long as the besiegers were ready to 
roll down rocks upon their assailants from 
above. 

At last, however, after a long conflict and 
much slaughter, Xerxes succeeding in forcing 
his way into the citadel. Some of his troops 
contrived to find a path by which they could 
climb up the walls. Here, after a desperate 
combat with those who were stationed to guard 
the place, they succeeded in gaining admission, 
and then opened the gates to their comrades 
below. The Persian soldiers, exasperated with 
the resistance which they had encountered, 
slew the soldiers of the garrison, perpetrated 
every imaginable violence on the wretched in- 
habitants who had fled there for shelter, and 
then plundered the citadel and set it on fire. 

The heart of Xerxes was filled with exulta- 
tion and joy as he thus arrived at the attain- 
ment of what had been the chief and prominent 
object of his campaign. To plunder and des- 
troy the city of Athens had been the great 
pleasure that he had promised himself in all 
the mighty preparations that he had made. 
This result was now realized, and he despatched 
a special messenger immediately to Susa with 
the triumphant tidings. 




CHAPTER XI. 

THE BATTLE OF SALAMIS. 

Salamis is an island of a very irregular form, 
lying in the Saronian Gulf, north of Egina, and 
to the westward of Athens. What was called 
the Port of Athens was on the shore opposite to 
Salamis, the city itself being situated on ele- 
vated land four or five miles back from the sea. 
From this port to the bay on the southern side 
of Salamis, where the Greek fleet was lying, it 
was only four or five miles more, so that, when 
Xerxes burned the city, the people on board the 
galleys in the fleet might easily see the smoke 
of the conflagration. 

The Isthmus of Corinth was west of Salamis, 

some fifteen miles, across the bay. The army, 

in retreating from Athens, toward the isthmus, 

would have necessarily to pass round the bay 

in a course somewhat circuitous, while the 

fleet, in following them, would pass in a direct 

line across it. The geographical relation of 

these places, a knowledge of which is necessary 

to a full understanding of the operations of the 

209 



210 XERXES. 

Greek and Persian forces, will be distinctly seen 
by comparing the above description with the 
map placed at the commencement of the fifth 
chapter. 

It had been the policy of the Greeks to keep 
the fleet and army as much as possible together, 
and thus, during the time in which the troops 
were attempting a concentration at Thermop- 
ylae, the ships made their rendezvous in the Ar- 
temisian Strait or Channel, directly opposite to 
that point of the coast. There they fought, 
maintaining their position desperately, day after 
day, as long as Leonidas and his Spartans held 
their ground on the shore. Their sudden disap- 
pearance from those waters, by which the Per- 
sians had been so much surprised, was caused 
by their having received intelligence that the 
pass had been carried and Leonidas destroyed. 
They knew then that Athens would be the next 
point of resistance by the land forces. They 
therefore fell back to Salamis, or, rather, to the 
bay lying between Salamis and the Athenian 
shore, that being the nearest position that they 
could take to support the operations of the army 
in their attempts to defend the capital. When, 
however, the tidings came to them that Athens 
had fallen, and that what remained of the army 
had retreated to the isthmus, the question at 
once arose whether the fleet should retreat too, 
across the bay, to the isthmus shore, with a view 



THE BATTLE OF SALAMIS. 211 

to co-operate more fully with the army in the 
new position which the latter had taken, or 
whether it should remain where it was, and de- 
fend itself as it best could against the Persian 
squadrons which would soon be drawing near. 
The commanders of the fleet held a consulta- 
tion to consider this question. 

In this consultation the Athenian and the Co- 
rinthian leaders took different views. In fact, 
they were very near coming into open collision. 
Such a difference of opinion, considering the cir- 
cumstances of the case, was not at all surpris- 
ing. It might, indeed, have naturally been ex- 
pected to arise, from the relative situation of the 
two cities, in respect to the danger which threat- 
ened them. If the Greek fleet were to withdraw 
from Salamis to the isthmus, it might be in a 
better position to defend Corinth, but it would, 
by such a movement, be withdrawing from the 
Athenian territories, and abandoning what re- 
mained in Attica wholly to the conqueror. The 
Athenians were, therefore, in favor of main- 
taining the position at Salamis, while the Co- 
rinthians were disposed to retire to the shores 
of the isthmus, and co-operate with the army 
there. 

The council was convened to deliberate on 
this subject before the news arrived of the act- 
ual fall of Athens, although, inasmuch as the 
Persians were advancing into Attica in im- 



212 XERXES. 

mense numbers^ and there was no Greek force 
left to defend the city, they considered its fall 
as all but inevitable. The tidings of the cap- 
ture and destruction of Athens came while the 
council was in session. This seemed to deter- 
mine the question. The Corinthian command- 
ers, and those from the other Peloponnesian 
cities, declared that it was perfectly absurd to 
remain any longer at Salamis, in a vain attempt 
to defend a country already conquered. The 
council was broken up in confusion, each com- 
mander retiring to his own ship, and the Pelo- 
ponnesians resolving to withdraw on the fol- 
lowing morning. Eurybiades, who, it will be 
recollected, was the commander-in-chief of all 
the Greek fleet, finding thus that it w^as impos- 
sible any longer to keep the ships together at 
Salamis, since a part of them would, at all events, 
withdraw, concluded to yield to the necessity of 
the case, and to conduct the whole fleet to the 
isthmus. He issued his orders accordingly, and 
the several commanders repaired to their 
respective ships to make the preparations. It 
was night when the council was dismissed, 
and the fleet was to move in the morning. 

One of the most influential and distinguished 
of the Athenian officers was a general named 
Themis tocles. Very soon after he had returned 
to his ship from this council, he was visited 
by another Athenian named Mnesiphilus, who, 



THE BATTLE OF SALAMIS. 213 

uneasy and anxious in the momentous crisis, had 
come in his boat, in the darkness of the night, 
to Themistocles's ship, to converse with liimon 
the 23lans of the morrow. Mnesiphihis asked 
Themistocles what was the decision of tlie 
council. 

'^To abandon Salamis/^ said Themistocles, 
'' and retire to the isthmus.''^ 

'^ Then,^' said Mnesiphilus, " we shall never 
have an opportunity to meet the enemy. I am 
sure that if we leave this position the fleet will 
be Avholly broken up, and that each portion will 
go, under its own commander, to defend its own 
state or seek its own safety, independently of 
the rest. We shall never be able to concen- 
trate our forces again. The result will be the 
inevitable dissolution of the fleet as a combined 
and allied force, in spite of all that Eurybiades 
or any one else can do to prevent it.^^ 

Mnesiphilus urged this danger with so much 
earnestness and eloquence as to make a very 
considerable impress on the mind of Themis- 
tocles. Themistocles said nothing, but his coun- 
tenance indicated that he was very strongly in- 
clined to adopt Mnesiphilus's views. Mnesi- 
jDhilus urged him to go immediately to Eury- 
biades, and endeavor to induce him to obtain a 
reversal of the decision of the council. The- 
mistocles, without expressing either assent or 
dissent, took his boat, and ordered the oarsmen 



214 XERXES. 

to row him to the galley of Eurybiades. Mne- 
si2:)hilus, having so far accomplished his object^ 
went away. 

Themistocles came in his boat to the side of 
Eurybiades^s galley. He said that he wished 
to S23eak with the general on a subject of great 
importance. Eurybiades, when this was re- 
ported to him, sent to invite Themistocles to 
come on board. Themistocles did so, and he 
urged upon the general the same arguments that 
Mnesiphilus had pressed upon him, namely, that 
if the fleet were once to move from their actual 
position, the different squadrons would inevi- 
tably sej)arate, and could never be assembled 
again. He urged Eurybiades, therefore, very 
strermously to call a new council, with a view 
of reversing the decision that had been made to 
retire and of resolving instead to give battle to 
the Persians at Salamis. 

Eurybiades was persuaded, and immediately 
took measures for convening the council again. 
The summons, sent around thus at midnight, 
calling upon the principal officers of the fleet to 
repair again in haste to the commander's galley, 
when they had only a short time before been 
dismissed from it, produced great excitement. 
The Corinthians, Avho had been in favor of the 
plan of abandoning Salamis, conjectured that 
the design might be to endeavor to reverse that 
decision, and they came to the council deter- 



THE BATTLE OF SAL AMIS. 216 

mined to resist any such attempt, if one should 
be made. 

When the officers had arrived, Themistocles 
began immediately to open the discussion, be- 
fore, in fact, Eurybiades had stated why he had 
called them together. A Corinthian officer in- 
terrupted and rebuked him for presuming to 
speak before his time. Themistocles retorted 
upon the Corinthian, and continued his ha- 
rangue. He urged the council to review their 
former decision, and to determine, after all, to 
remain at Salamis. He, however, now used 
different arguments from those which he had 
employed when speaking to Eurybiades alone ; 
for to have directly charged the officers them- 
selves with the design of which he had accused 
them to Eurybiades, namely, that of abandon- 
ing their allies, and retiring with their respect- 
ive ships, each to his own coast, in case the posi- 
tion at Salamis were to be given up, would 
only incense them, and arouse a hostility which 
would determine them against anything that 
he might propose. 

He therefore urged the expediency of remain- 
ing at Salamis on other grounds. Salamis was 
a much more advantageous position, he said, 
than the coast of the isthmus, for a small fleet 
to occupy in awaiting an attack from a large 
one. At Salamis they were defended in part 
by the projections of the land, which protected 



216 XERXES. 

their flanks, and prevented their being assailed, 
except in front, and their front they might make 
a very narrow one. At the isthmus, on the con- 
trary, there was a long, unvaried, and unshel- 
tered coast, with no salient points to give 
strength or protection to their position there. 
They could not expect to derive serious advan- 
tage from any degree of co-operation with the 
army on the land which would be practicable 
at the isthmus, while their situation at sea 
there would be far more exposed and dangerous 
than where they then were. Besides, many 
thousands of the people had fled to Salamis for 
refuge and protection, and the fleet, by leaving 
its present position, Avould be guilty of basely 
abandoning them all to hopeless destruction, 
without even making an effort to save them. 

This last was, in fact, the great reason why 
the Athenians were so unwilling to abandon 
Salamis. The unhappy fugitives with which 
the island was thronged were their wives and 
children, and they were extremely unwilling 
to go away and leave them to so cruel a fate as 
they knew would await them if the fleet were 
to be withdrawn. The Corinthians, on the 
other hand, considered Athens as already lost, 
and it seemed madness to them to linger use- 
lessly in the vicinity of the ruin which had 
been made, while there were other states and 
cities in other quarters of Greece yet to be 



THE BATTLE OF SALAMIS. 217 

saved. The Corinthicin speaker who had re- 
buked Themistocles at first interrupted him 
again, angrily, before he finished his appeal. 

" You have no right to speak/' said he. 
'^ You have no longer a country. When you 
cease to represent a power, you have no right 
to take a part in our councils/' 

This cruel retort aroused in the mind of The- 
mistocles a strong feeling of indignation and 
anger against the Corinthian. He loaded his 
opponent, in return, with bitter reproaches, 
and said, in conclusion, that as long as the 
Athenians had two hundred ships in the fleet, 
they had still a country — one, too, of sufficient 
importance to the general defense to give them 
a much better title to be heard in the common 
consultations than any Corinthian could pre- 
sume to claim. 

Then turning to Eurybiades again, Themis- 
tocles implored him to remain at Salamis, and 
give battle to the Persians there, as that was, 
he said, the only course by which any hope re- 
mained to them of the salvation of Greece. 
He declared that the Athenian part of the 
fleet would never go to the isthmus. If the 
others decided on going there, they, the Athe- 
nians, would gather all the fugitives they could 
from the island of Salamis and from the coasts 
of Attica, and make the best of their way to 
Italy, where there was a territory to which they 

16— Xerxes 



218 XERXES. 

had some claim;, and, abandoning Greece for-, 
ever, they would found a new kingdom there. 

Eurybiades, the commander-in-chief, if he 
was not convinced by the arguments that The- 
mistocles had offered, was alarmed at his decla- 
ration that the Athenian ships would abandon 
the cause of the Greeks if the fleet abandoned 
Salamis ; he accordingly gave his voice very 
decidedly for remaining where they were. The 
rest of the officers finally acquiesced in this de- 
cision, and the council broke up, the various 
members of it returning each to his own com- 
mand. It was now nearly morning. The 
whole fleet had been, necessarily, during the 
night in a state of great excitement and sus- 
pense, all anxious to learn the result of these 
deliberations. The awe and solemnity which 
would, of course, pervade the minds of men at 
midnight, while such momentous questions 
were pending, were changed to an appalling 
sense of terror, toward the dawn, by an earth- 
quake which then took place, and which, as is 
usually the case with such convulsions, not only 
shook the land, but was felt by vessels on the 
sea. The men considered this phenomenon as 
a solemn warning from heaven, and measures 
were immediately adopted for appeasing, by 
certain special sacrifices and ceremonies, the 
divine displeasure which the shock seemed to 
portend. 



THE BATTLE OF SAL A MIS. 219 

In the meantime, the Persian fleet, which we 
left, it will be recollected, in the channels be- 
tween Euboea and the main land, near to Ther- 
mopylae, had advanced when they found that 
the Greeks had left those waters, and, follow- 
ing their enemies to the southward through the 
channel called the Euripus, had doubled the 
promontory called Sunium, which is the south- 
ern promontory of Attica, and then, moving 
northward again along the western coast of 
Attica, had approached Phalerum, which was 
not far from Salamis. Xerxes, haviug con- 
cluded his operations at Athens, advanced to 
the same point by land. 

The final and complete success of the Persian 
expedition seemed now almost sure. All the 
country north of the peninsula had fallen. 
The Greek army had retreated to the isthmus, 
having been driven from every other post, and 
its last forlorn hope of being able to resist the 
advance of its victorious enemies was depend- 
ing there. And the commanders of the Persian 
fleet, having driven the Greek squadrons in the 
same manner from strait to strait and from sea 
to sea, saw the discomfited galleys drawn up, 
in apparently their last place of refuge, in the 
Bay of Salamis, and only waiting to be cap- 
tured and destroyed. 

In a word, everything seemed ready for 
the decisive and final blow, and Xerxes sum- 



220 XERXES 

moned a grand council of war on board one of 
the vessels of the fleet as soon as he arrived at 
Phalerum, to decide upon the time and manner 
of striking it. 

The convening of this council was arranged^ 
and the deliberations themselves conducted, 
with great parade and ceremony. The princes 
of the various nations represented in the army 
and in the fleet, and the leading Persian offi- 
cers and nobles were summoned to attend it. 
It was held on board one of the principal gal- 
leys, where great preparations had been made 
for receiving so august an assemblage. A 
throne was provided for the king, and seats for 
the various commanders according to their re- 
spective- ranks, and a conspicuous place was 
assigned to Artemisia, the Carian queen, who, 
the reader will perhaps recollect, was described 
as one of the prominent naval commanders, in 
the account given of the great review at Do- 
riscus. Mardonius appeared at the council as 
the king's representative and the conductor of 
the deliberations, there being required, accord- 
ing to the parliamentary etiquette of those 
days, in such royal councils as these, a sort of 
mediator, to stand between the king and his 
counselors, as if the monarch himself was on 
too sublime an elevation of dignity and gran- 
deur to be directly addressed even by princes 
and nobles. 



THE BATTLE OF SALAMIS. 221* 

Accordingly, when the council was con- 
vened and the time arrived for opening the 
deliberations, the king directed Mardonius to 
call npon the commanders present, one by one, 
for their sentiments on the question whether it 
were advisable or not to attack the Greek fleet 
at Salamis. Mardonius did so. They all ad- 
vised that the attack should be made, urging 
severally various considerations to enforce their 
opinions, and all evincing a great deal of zeal 
and ardor in the cause, and an impatient desire 
that the great final conflict should come on. 

When, however, it came to Artemisia's turn 
to speak, it appeared that she was of a different 
sentiment from the rest. She commenced her 
speech with something like an apology for pre- 
suming to give the king her council. She 
said that, notwithstanding her sex, she had 
performed her part, with other commanders, in 
the battles which had already occurred, and 
that she was, perhaps, entitled accordingly, in 
the consultations which were held, to express 
her opinion. '' Say, then, to the king,'' she 
continued, addressing Mardonius, as all the 
others had done, "^^ that my judgment is, that 
we should not attack the Greek fleet at Sala- 
mis, but, on the contrary, that we should avoid 
a battle. It seems to me that we have nothing 
to gain, but should put a great deal at hazard 
by a general naval confli<;t at the present time. 



222 XERXES. 

The truth is, that the Greeks, always terrible 
as combatants, are rendered desperate now by 
the straits to which they are reduced and the 
losses that they have sustained. The seamen 
of our fleet are as inferior to them in strength 
and courage as women are to men. I am sure 
that it will be a very dangerous thing to en- 
counter them in their present chafed and irri- 
tated temper. Whatever others may think, I 
myself should not dare to answer for the re- 
sult. 

" Besides, situated as they are,^' continued 
Artemisia, ^'a battle is what they must most 
desire, and, of course, it is adverse to our in- 
terest to accord it to them. I have ascertained 
that they have but a small supply of food, either 
in their fleet or upon the island of Salamis, 
while they have, besides their troops, a great 
multitude of destitute and helpless fugitives to 
be fed. If we simply leave them to themselves 
under the blockade in which our position here 
now places them, they will soon be reduced to 
great distress. Or, if we withdraw from them, 
and proceed at once to the Peloponnesus, to co- 
operate with the army there, we shall avoid all 
the risk of a battle, and I am sure that the 
Greek fleet will never dare to follow or to 
molest us.'''' 

The several members of the council listened 
to this unexpected address of Artemisia with 



THE BATTLE OF SALAMTS. 223 

great attention and interest^ but witli very dif- 
ferent feelings. Slie had many friends among 
the counselors, and they were anxious and un- 
easy at hearing her speak in this manner, for 
they knew very well that it was the king's 
decided intention that, a battle should be 
fought, and they feared that by this bold and 
strenuous opposition to it, Artemisia would incur 
the mighty monarch's displeasure. There were 
others who were jealous of the influence which 
Artemisia enjoyed, and envious of the favor 
with which they knew that Xerxes regarded 
her. These men were secretly pleased to hear 
her .uttering sentiments by which they confi- 
dently believed that she would excite the anger 
of the king, and wholly lose her advantageous 
position. Both the hopes and the fears, how- 
ever, entertained respectively by the queen's 
enemies and friends, proved altogether ground- 
less. Xerxes was not displeased. On the con- 
trary, he applauded Artemisia's ingenuity and 
eloquence in the highest terms, though he 
said, nevertheless, that he would follow the 
advice of the other counselors. He dismissed 
the assembly, and gave orders to prepare for 
battle. 

In the mean time a day or two had passed 
away, and the Greeks, who had been originally 
very little inclined to acquiesce in the decision 
which Eurybiades had made, under the influ- 



224. XERXES. 

ence of ThemistocleSj to remain at Salamis and 
give the Persians battle^, became more and more 
dissatisfied and uneasy as the great crisis drew 
nigh. In fact, the discontent and disaffection 
which appeared in certain portions of the fleet 
became so decided and so open, that Themisto- 
cles feared that some of the commanders would 
actually revolt, and go away with their squad- 
rons in a body, in defiance of the general de- 
cision to remain. To prevent such a desertion 
as this, he contrived the following very desper- 
ate stratagem. 

He had a slave in his family named Sicinnus, 
who was an intelligent and educated man, 
though a slave. In fact, he was the teacher 
of Themistocles^s children. Instances of this 
kind, in which slaves were refined and culti- 
vated men, were not uncommon in ancient 
times, as slaves were, in many instances, cap- 
tives taken in war, who before their captivity 
had occupied as high social positions as their 
masters. Themistocles determined to send 
Sicinnus to the Persian fleet with a message 
from him, which should induce the Persians 
themselves to take measures to prevent the dis- 
persion of the Greek fleet. Having given the 
slave, therefore, his secret instructions, he put 
him into a boat when night came on, with oars- 
men who were directed to row him wherever he 
should require them to go. The boat pushed 



THE BATTLE OF SALAMIS. 225 

off stealthily from Tliemistocles's galley, and, 
taking care to keep clear of the Greek ships 
which lay at anchor near them, went southward 
toward the Persian fleet. When the boat 
reached the Persian galleys, Sicinniis asked to 
see the commander, and, on being admitted to 
an interview with him, he informed him that 
he came from Themistocles, who was the 
leader, he said^ of the Athenian portion of the 
Greek fleet. 

^' I am charged," he added, '^to say to yon 
from Themistocles that he considers the cause 
of the Greeks as wholly lost, and he is now, ac- 
cordingly, desirous himself of coming over to 
the Persian side. This, however, he cannot 
actually and openly do, on account of the situ- 
ation in which he is placed in respect to the 
rest of the fleet. He has, however, sent me to 
inform you that the Greek fleet is in a very dis- 
ordered and helpless condition, being distracted 
by the dissensions of the commanders, and the 
general discouragement and despair of the men ; 
that some divisions are secretly intending to 
make their escape ; and that, if you can pre- 
vent this by surrounding them, or by taking 
such positions as to intercept any who may at- 
tempt to withdraw, the whole squadron will in- 
evitably fall into your hands." 

Having made this communication, Sicinnus 
went on board his boat again, and returned to 



22G XERXES. 

the Greek fleet as secretly and stealthily as he 
came. 

The Persians immediately determined to re- 
sort to the measures which Themistocles had 
recommended to prevent the escape of any part 
of the Greek fleet. There was a small island 
between Salamis and the coast of Attica, that 
is, on the eastern side of Salamis, called Psyt- 
talia, which was in such a position as to com- 
mand, in a great measure, the channel of water 
between Salamis and the mainland on this side. 
The Persians sent forward a detachment of 
galleys to take possession of this island in the 
night. By this means they hoped to prevent 
the escape of any part of the Greek squadron 
in that direction. Besides, they foresaw that 
in the approaching battle the principal scene 
of the conflict must be in that vicinity, and 
that, consequently, the island would become 
the great resort of the disabled ships and the 
wounded men, since they would naturall}^ seek 
refuge on the nearest land. To preoccupy this 
ground, therefore, seemed an important step. 
It would enable them, when the terrible con- 
flict should come on, to drive back any wretched 
refugees who might attempt to escape from 
destruction by seeking the shore. 

By taking possession of this island, and sta- 
tioning galleys in the vicinity of it, all which 
was done secretly in the night, the Persians 



THE BATTLE OF SALAMIS. 227 

cut off all possibility of escape for the Greeks 
in that direction. At the same time, they sent 
another considerable detachment of their fleet 
to the westward, which was the direction to- 
ward the isthmus, ordering the galleys thus sent 
to station themselves in such a manner as to 
prevent any portion of the Greek fleet from 
going round the island of Salamis, and making 
their escape through the northwestern channel. 
By this means the Greek fleet was environed on 
every side — hemmed in, though they were not 
aware of it, in such a way as to defeat any at- 
tempt which any division might make to retire 
from the scene. 

The first intelligence which the Greeks re- 
ceived of their being thus surrounded was from 
an Athenian general named Aristides, who came 
one night from the island of ^gina to the Greek 
fleet, making his way with great difficulty 
through the lines of Persian galleys. Aristides 
had been, in the political conflicts which had 
taken place in former years at Athens, Themis- 
tocles's great rival and enemy. He had been 
defeated in the contests which had taken place, 
and had been banished from Athens. He now, 
however, made his way through the enemy's 
lines, incurring, in doing it, extreme difficulty 
and danger, in order to inform his country- 
men of their peril, and to assist, if possible, in 
saving them. 



228 XEBXES. 

When he reached the Greek fleet, the com- 
manders were in council, agitating, in angry and 
incriminating debates, the perpetually recur- 
ring question whether they should retire to the 
isthmus, or remain where they were. Aris- 
tides called Themistocles out of the council. 
Themistocles was very much surprised at see- 
ing his ancient enemy thus unexpectedly ap- 
pear. Aristides introduced the conversation by 
saying that he thought that at such a crisis 
they ought to lay aside every private animosity, 
and only emulate each other in the efforts and 
sacrifices which they could respectively make to 
defend their country ; that he had, accordingly, 
come from ^gina to join the fleet, with a view 
of rendering any aid that it might be in his 
power to afford ; that it was now wholly useless 
to debate the question of retiring to the isth- 
mus, for such a movement was no longer pos- 
sible. " The fleet is surrounded, ^^ said he. 
*^ The Persian galleys are stationed on every 
side. It was with the utmost difficulty that I 
could make my way through the lines. Even 
if the whole assembly, and Eurybiades himself, 
were resolved on withdrawing to the isthmus, 
the thing could not now be done. Eeturn, 
therefore, and tell them this, and say that to 
defend themselves where they are is the only 
alternative that now remains." 

In reply to this communication, Themistocles 



THE BATTLE OF SALAMIS. 229 

Baid that nothing could give him greater pleas- 
ure than to learn what Aristides had stated. 
'^ The movement which the Persians have 
made," he said, '' was in consequence of a com- 
munication which I myself sent to them. I sent 
it, in order that some of our Greeks, who seem 
so very reluctant to fight, might be compelled 
to do so. But you must come yourself into the 
assembly," he added, " and make your state- 
ment directly to the commanders. They will 
not believe it if they hear it from me. Come 
in, and state what you have seen." 

Aristides accordingly entered the assembly, 
and informed the officers who were convened 
that to retire from their present position was 
no longer possible, since the sea to the west was 
fully guarded by lines of Persian ships, which 
had been stationed there to intercept them. He 
had just come in himself, he said, from ^gina, 
and had found great difficulty in passing 
through the lines, though he had only a single 
small boat, and was favored by the darkness of 
the night. He was convinced that the Greek 
fleet was entirely surrounded. 

Having said this, Aristides withdrew. Al- 
though he could come, as a witness, to give his 
testimony in respect to facts, he was not entitled 
to take any part in the deliberations. 

The assembly was thrown into a state of the 
greatest possible excitement by the intelligence 



230 XEEXES. 

wliicli Aristides had communicated. Instead 
of producing harmony among them, it made the 
discord more violent and uncontrollable. Of 
those who had before wished to retire, some 
were now enraged that they had not been al- 
lowed to do so while the opportunity remained ; 
others disbelieved Aristides's statements, and 
were still eager to go ; while the rest, confirmed 
in their previous determination to remain 
where they were, rejoiced to find that retreat 
was no longer possible. The debate was con- 
fused and violent. It. turned, in a great meas- 
ure, on the degree of credibility to be attached 
to the account which Aristides had given them. 
Many of the assembly wholly disbelieved it. 
It was a stratagem, they maintained, contrived 
by the Athenian party, and those who wished 
to remain, in order to accomplish their end of 
keeping the fleet from changing its posi- 
tion; 

The doubts, however, which the assembly 
felt in respect to the truth of Aristides^s tidings 
were soon dispelled by new and incontestable 
evidence ; for, while the debate was going on, it 
was announced that a large galley — a trireme, 
as it was called^iad come in from the Persian 
fleet. This galley proved to be a Greek ship 
from the island of Tenos, one which Xerxes, in 
prosecution of his plan of compelling those por- 
tions of the Grecian territories that he had con- 



THE BATTLE OF SALAMIS. 281 

quered, or that had surrendered to him, to fur- 
nish forces to aid him in subduing the rest, had 
pressed into his service. The commander of 
this galley, unwilling to take part against his 
countrymen in the conflict, had decided to de- 
sert the Persian fleet by taking advantage of 
the night, and to come over to the Greeks. The 
name of the commander of this trireme was Pa- 
rsetius. He confirmed fully all that Aristides 
had said. He assured the Greeks that they 
were completely surrounded, and that nothing 
remained for them but to prepare, where they 
were, to meet the attack which would certainly 
be made upon them in the morning. The ar- 
rival of this trireme was thus of very essential 
service to the Greeks. It put an end to their 
discordant debates, and united them, one and 
all, in the work of making resolute preparations 
for action. This vessel was also of very essen- 
tial service in the conflict itself which ensued ; 
and the Greeks were so grateful to Parastius and 
to his comrades for the adventurous courage 
which they displayed in coming over under such 
circumstances, in such a night, to espouse the 
cause and to share -the dangers of their country- 
men, that after the battle they caused all their 
names to be engraved upon a sacred tripod, 
made in the most costly manner for the pur- 
pose, and then sent the tripod to be deposited 
at the oracle of Delphi, where it long remained 



282 XERXES. 

a monument of this example of Delian patriot- 
ism and fidelity. 

As the morning approached, the preparations 
were carried forward with ardor and energy, on 
board both fleets, for the great struggle which 
was to ensue. Plans were formed ; orders were 
given ; arms were examined and placed on the 
decks of the galleys, where they would be most 
ready at hand. The officers and soldiers gave 
mutual charges and instructions to each other 
in respect to the care of their friends and the 
disposal of their effects — charges and instruc- 
tions which each one undertook to execute for 
his friend in case he should survive him. The 
commanders endeavored to animate and encour- 
age their men by cheerful looks, and by words 
of confidence and encouragement. They who 
felt resolute and strong endeavored to inspirit 
the weak and irresolute, while those who shrank 
from the approaching contest, and dreaded the 
result of it, concealed their fears, and endeav- 
ored to appear impatient for the battle. 

Xerxes caused an elevated seat or throne to 
be prepared for himself on an eminence near 
the shore, upon the main land, in order that he 
might be a personal witness of the battle. He 
had a guard and other attendants around him. 
Among these were a number of scribes or sec- 
retaries, who were prepared with writing ma- 
terials to record the events which might tak« 



THE BATTLE OF SALAMIS. 233 

placG;, as they occurred, and especially to register 
the name of those whom Xerxes should see dis- 
tinguishing themselves by their courage or by 
their achievements. He justly supposed that 
these arrangements, the whole fleet being fully 
informed in regard to them, would animate the 
several commanders with strong emulation, and 
excite them to make redoubled exertions to per- 
form their 'part well. The record which was 
thus to be kept, under the personal supervision 
of the sovereign, was with a view to punish- 
ments too, as well as to honors and rewards ; 
and it happened in many instances during the 
battle that ensued, that commanders, who, after 
losing their ships, escaped to the shore, were 
brought up before Xerxes's throne, and there 
expiated their fault or their misfortune, which- 
ever it might have been, by being beheaded on 
the spot, without mercy. Some of the officers 
thus executed were Greeks, brutally slaughtered 
for not being successful in fighting, by com- ^ 
pulsion, against their own countrymen. 

As the dawn approached, Themistocles called 
together as many of the Athenian forces as it 
was possible to convene, assembling them at a 
place upon the shore of Salamis where he could 
conveniently address them, and there made a 
speech to them, as was customary with the 
Greek commanders before going into battle. 
He told them that, in such contests as that in 

17— Xorxes 



234 XERXES. 

which they were about to engage^ the result 
depended, not on the relative numbers of the 
combatants, but on the resohition and activity 
which they displayed. He reminded them of 
the instances in which small bodies of men, 
firmly banded together by a strict discipline, 
and animated by courage and energy, had over- 
thrown enemies whose numbers far exceeded 
their own. The Persians were more' numerous, 
he admitted, than they, but still the Greeks 
would conquer them. If they faithfully obeyed 
their orders, and acted strictly and persever- 
ingly in concert, according to the plans formed 
by the commanders, and displayed the usual 
courage and resolution of Greeks, he was sure 
of victory. 

As soon as Themistocles had finished his 
speech, he ordered his men to embark, and the 
fleet immediately afterward formed itself in 
battle array. 

Notwithstanding the strictness of the order 
and discipline which generally prevailed in 
Greek armaments of every kind, there was 
great excitement and much confusion in the 
fleet while making all these preparations, and 
this excitement and confusion increased contin- 
ually as the morning advanced and the hour for 
the conflict drew nigh. The passing of boats 
to and fro, the dashing of the oars, the clangor 
of the weapons, the vociferation of orders by 



THE BATTLE OF SALAMIS. 235 

the officers and of responses by the men, mingled 
with each other in dreadful turmoil, while all 
the time the vast squadrons were advancing 
toward each other, each party of combatants 
eager to begin the contest.. In fact, so full of 
wild excitement was the scene, that at length 
the battle was found to be raging on every side, 
while no one knew or could remember, how it 
began. Some said that a ship, which had been 
sent away a short time before to ^gina to ob- 
tain succors, was returning that morning, and 
that she commenced the action as she came 
through the Persian lines. Others said the 
Greek squadrons advanced as soon as they could 
see, and attacked the Persians; and there were 
some whose imaginations were so much excited 
by the scene, that they saw a female form por- 
trayed among the dim mists of the morning, that 
urged the Greeks onward by beckonings and 
calls. They heard her voice, they said, crying 
to them, '' Come on ! come on ! this is no 
time to linger on your oars." ^-i 

However this may be, the battle was soon fu- ' ^ 
riously raging on every part of the Bay of Sala- 
mis, exhibiting a widespread scene of conflict, 
fury, rage, despair, and death, such as had then 
been seldom witnessed in any naval conflict, and 
such as human eyes can now never look upon 
again. In modern warfare the smoke of the 
guns soon draws an impenetrable veil over the 



236 XERXEB. 

scene of horror, and the perpetual thunder of 
the artillery overpowers the general din. In a 
modern battle, therefore, none of the real hor- 
rors of the conflict can either be heard or seen 
by any spectator placed beyond the immediate 
scene of it. The sights and the sounds are alike 
buried and concealed beneath the smoke and the 
noise of the cannonading. There were, however, 
no such causes in this case to obstruct the ob- 
servations which Xerxes was making from his 
throne on the shore. The air was calm, the sky 
serene, the water was smooth, and the atmos- 
phere was as transparent and clear at the end 
of the battle as at the beginning. Xerxes could 
discern every ship, and follow it Avith liis eye 
in all its motions. He could see who advanced 
and who retreated. Out of the hundreds of 
separate conflicts he could choose any one, and 
watch the progress of it from the commence- 
ment to the termination. He could see the 
combats on the decks, the falling of repulsed 
assailants into the water, the weapons broken, 
the wounded carried away, and swimmers strug- 
gling like insects on the smooth surface of the 
sea. He could see the Avrecks, too, which were 
drifted upon the shores, and the captured gal- 
leys, which, after those wlio defended them had 
been vanquished — some killed, others thrown 
overboard, and others made prisoners — were 



THE BATTLE OF SALAMIS. 237 

slowly towed away by the victors to a place of 
safety. 

There was one incident which occurred in 
this scene, as Xerxes looked down upon it from 
the eminence where he sat, which greatly in- 
terested and excited him, though he was de- 
ceived in respect to the true nature of it. The 
incident was one of Artemisia's stratagems. 
It must be premised, in relating the story, that 
Artemisia was not without enemies among the 
officers of the Persian fleet. Many of them 
were envious of the high distinction which she 
enjoyed, and jealous of the attention which she 
received from the king, and of the influence 
vvhich she possessed over him. This feeling 
showed itself very distinctly at the grand coun- 
cil, when she gave her advice, in connection 
with that of the other commanders, to the king. 
Among the most decided of her enemies was a 
certain captain named Damasithymus. Arte- 
misia had had a special quarrel with him while 
the fleet was coming through the Hellespont, 
which, though settled for the time, left the 
minds of both parties in a state of great hostil- 
ity toward each other. 

It happened, in the course of the battle, that 
the ship which Artemisia personally command- 
ed and that of Damasithymus were engaged, 
together with other Persian vessels, in the same 
part of the bay ; and at a time when the ardor 



238 XERXES. 

and confusion of the conflict was at its height, 
the galley of Artemisia^ and some others that 
were in company with hers, became separated 
from the rest, perhaps by the too eager pursuit 
of an enemy, and as other Greek ships came 
up suddenly to the assistance of their com- 
rades, the Persian vessels found themselves in 
great danger, and began to retreat, followed 
by their enemies. We speak of the retreat- 
ing galleys as Persian, because they were on 
the Persian side in the contest, though it 
happened that they were really ships from 
Greek nations, which Xerxes had bribed or 
forced into his service. The Greeks knew them 
to be enemies, by the Persian flag which they 
bore. 

In the retreat, and while the ships were more 
or less mingled together in the confusion, Arte- 
misia perceived that the Persian galley nearest 
her was that of Damasithymus. She immedi- 
ately caused her own Persian flag to be pulled 
down, and, resorting to such other artifices as 
might tend to make her vessel appear to be a 
Greek galley, she began to act as if she were 
one of the pursuers instead of one of the pur- 
sued. She bore down upon the ship of Dama- 
sithymus, saying to her crew that to attack 
and sink that ship was the only way to save 
their own lives. They accordingly attacked it 
with the utmost fury. The Athenian ships 



THE BATTLE OF SALAMIS. 239 

which were near, seeing Artemisia's galley thus 
engaged, supposed that it was one of their own, 
and pressed on, leaving the vessel of Damasi- 
thymus at Artemisia's mercy. It was such 
mercy as would be expected of a woman who 
would volunteer to take command of a squad- 
ron of ships of war, and go forth on an active 
campaign to fight for her life among such fero- 
cious tigers as Greek soldiers always were, con- 
sidering it all an excursion of pleasure. Arte- 
misia killed Damasithymus and all of his crew, 
and sunk his ship, and then, the crisis of 
danger being past, she made good her retreat 
back to the Persian lines. She probably feft 
no special animosity against the crew of this 
ill-fated vessel, but she thought it most pru- 
dent to leave no man alive to tell the story. 

Xerxes watched this transaction from his 
place on the hill with extreme interest and 
pleasure. He saw the vessel of Artemisia bear- 
ing down upon the other, which last he sup- 
posed, of course, from Artemisia's attacking 
it, was a vessel of the enemy. The only sub- 
ject of doubt was whether the attacking ship 
was really that of Artemisia. The officers who 
stood about Xerxes at the time that the trans- 
action ov^curred assured him that it was. They 
knew it well by certain peculiarities in its con- 
struction. Xerxes then watched the progress 
of the contest with the most eager interest, and. 



240 XERXES. 

when he saw the result of it, he praised Arte> 
misia in the highest terms, saying that the men 
in his fleet behaved like Avomen, while the only 
woman in it behaved like a man. 

•Thus Artemisia's exploit operated like a 
double stratagem. Both the Greeks and the 
Persians were deceived, and she gained an ad- 
vantage by both the deceptions. She saved 
her life by leading the Greeks to believe that 
her galley was their friend, and she gained 
great glory and renown among the Persians by 
making them believe that the vessel which she 
sunk was that of an enemy. 

Though these and some of the other scenes 
and incidents which Xerxes witnessed as he 
looked down upon the battle gave him pleasure, 
yet the curiosity and interest with which he 
surveyed the opening of the contest were grad- 
ually changed to impatience, vexation, and 
rage as he saw in its progress that the Greeks 
were everywhere gaining the victory. Not- 
withstanding the discord and animosity which 
had reigned among the commanders in their 
councils and debates, the men were united, res- 
olute, and firm when the time arrived for ac- 
tion ; and they fought with such desperate cour- 
age and activity, and, at the same time, with 
so much coolness, circumspection, and disci- 
pline, that the Persian lines were, before many 
hours, everywhere compelled to give way. A 



THE BATTLE OF SALAMIS. 241 

striking example of the indomitable and effi- 
cient resolution which, on such (5ccasions, 
always characterized the Greeks, was shown in 
the conduct of Aris tides. The reader will rec- 
ollect that the Persians, on the night before 
the battle, had taken possession of the island of 
Psyttalia — which was near the center of the 
scene of contest — for the double purpose of ena- 
bling themselves to use it as a place of refuge 
and retreat during the battle, and of prevent- 
ing their enemies from doing so. Now Aris- 
tides had no command. He had been expelled 
from Athens by the influence of Themistocles 
and his other enemies. He had come across 
from j^gina to the fleet at Salamis, alone, to 
give his countrymen information of the dispo- 
sitions which the Persians had made for sur- 
rounding them. When the battle began, he 
had been left, it seems, on the shore of Salamis 
a spectator. There was a small body of troo]3S 
left there also, as a guard to the shore. In the 
course of the combat, when Aristides found 
that the services of this guard were no longer 
likely to be required where they were, he 
placed himself at the head of them, obtained 
possession of boats or a galley, transported the 
men across the channel, landed them on the 
island of Psyttalia, conquered the post, and 
killed every man that the Persians had stationed 
there. 



242 XERXES. 

When the day was spent, and the evening 
came on/» it was found that the result of the 
battle was a Greek victory, and yet it was not 
a victory so decisive as to compel the Persians 
wholly to retire. Vast numbers of the Persian 
ships were destroyed, but still so many remained, 
that when at night they drew back from the 
scene of the conflict, toward their anchorage 
ground at Phalerum, the Greeks were very 
willing to leave them unmolested there. The 
Greeks, in fact, had full employment on the fol- 
low^ing day in reassembling the scattered rem- 
nants of their own fleet, repairing the damages 
that they had sustained, taking care of tlieir 
wounded men, and, in a word, attending to the 
thousand urgent and pressing exigencies always 
arising in the service of a fleet after a battle, 
even when it has been victorious in the contest. 
They did not know in exactly what condition 
the Persian fleet had been left, nor how far 
there might be danger of a renewal of the con- 
flict on the following day. They devoted all 
their time and attention, therefore, to strength- 
ening their defenses and reorganizing the fleet, so 
as to be ready in case a new assault should be 
made upon them. 

But Xerxes had no intention of any new at- \ 
tack. The loss of this battle gave a final blow 
to, his expectations of being able to carry his 
conquests in Greece any further. He too, like 



THE BATTLE OF SALAMIS, 243 

the Greeks^ employed his men in industrious 
and vigorous efforts to repair the damages 
which had been done, and to reassemble and 
reorganize that portion of the fleet which had 
not been destroyed. While, however, his men 
were doing this, he was himself revolving in 
his mind, moodily and despairingl}^, plans, not 
for new conflicts, but for the safest and speed- 
iest way of making his own personal escape 
from the dangers around him back to his home 
in Susa. 

In the mean time, the surface of the sea, far 
and wide in every direction, was covered with 
the wrecks, and remnants, and fragments 
strewed over it by the battle. Dismantled 
hulks, masses of entangled spars and rigging, 
broken oars, weapons of every description, and 
the swollen and ghastly bodies of the dead, 
floated on the rolling swell of the sea wherever 
the winds or the currents carried them. At length 
many of these mournful memorials of the strife 
found their way across the whole breadth of the 
Mediterranean, and were driven up upon the 
beach on the coast of Africa, at a barbarous 
country called Colias. The savages dragged 
the fragments up out of the sand to use as fuel 
for their fires, pleased with their unexpected 
acquisitions, but wholly ignorant, of course, of 
the nature of the dreadful tragedy to which 
their coming was due. The circumstance, how- 



244 



XERXES. 



ever, explained to the Greeks an ancient proph- 
esy which had been uttered long before in 




Xenophon. 

Athens, and which the interpreters of such 
mysteries had never been able to understand, 
The prophecy was this . 

The Colian dame on Afric's shores 
Shall roast their food with Persian oars. 



CHAPTER XII. 

THE RETURi^ OE XERXES TO PERSIA. 

Mardokius, it will be recollected, was the 
.commander-in-chief of the forces of Xerxes, 
and thus, next to Xerxes himself, he was the 
officer highest in rank of all those who attend- 
ed the expedition. He was, in fact, a sort of 
prime minister, on whom the responsibility 
for almost all the measures for the govern- 
ment and conduct of the expedition had 
been thrown. Men in such positions, while 
they may expect the highest rewards and 
honors from their sovereign in case of success, 
have always reason to apprehend the worst of 
consequences to themselves in case of failure. 
The night after the battle of Salamis, ac- 
cordingly, Mardonius was in great fear. He 
did not distrust the future success of the ex- 
pedition if it were allowed to go on ; but, 
knowing the character of such despots as those 
who ruled great nations in that age oi the 
world, he was well aware that he might reason- 
ably expect, at any moment, the appearance of 

officers sent from Xerxes to cut. off his head. 

245 



246 XERXES. 

His anxiety was increased by observing that 
Xerxes seemed very much depressed, and very 
restless and uneasy, after the battle, as if he 
were revolving in his mind some extraordinary 
design. He presently thought that he perceived 
indications that the king was planning a re- 
treat. Mardonius, after much he£:tation, con- 
cluded to speak to him, and endeavor to dispel 
his anxieties and fears, and lead him to take a 
more favorable view of the prospects of the ex- 
pedition. He accordingly accosted him on the 
subject somewhat as follows : 

'' It istrue,^' said he, ^^that we were not as 
successful in the combat yesterday as we 
desired to be ; but this reverse, as well as all 
the preceding disasters that we have met with, 
is, after all, of comparatively little moment. 
Your majesty has gone steadily on, accomplish- 
ing most triumphantly all the substantial ob- 
jects aimed at in undertaking the expedition. 
Your troops have advanced successfully by land 
against all opposition. With them you have 
traversed Thrace, Macedon, and Thessaly. 
You have fought yonr way, against the most 
desperate resistance, through the Pass of Ther- 
mopylae. You have overrun all Northern 
Greece. You have burned Athens. Thus, 
far from there being any uncertainty or doubt 
in respect to the success of the expedition, we 
see that all the great objects which you pro- 



THE RETURN TO PERSIA. 247 

posed by it are already accomplished. The 
fleet, it is true, has now suffered extensive 
damage ; but we must remember that it is 
upon the army, not upon the fleet, that our 
hopes and expectatioiis mainly depend. The 
army is safe ; and it cannot be possible that the 
Greeks can hereafter bring any force into the 
field by which il can be seriously endangered.'^ 

By these and similar sentiments, Mardonius 
endeavored to revive and restore the failing 
courage and resolution of the king. He founds 
however, that he met with very partial success. 
Xerxes was silent, thoughtful, and oppressed 
apparently with a sense of anxious concern. 
Mardonius finally proposed that, even if the 
king should think it best to return himself to 
Susa, he should not abandon the enterprise 
of subduing Greece, but that he should leave 
a portion of the army under his (Mardonius's) 
charge, and he would undertake, he said, to 
complete the work which had been so success- 
fully begun. Three hundred thousand men, 
he was convinced, would be sufficient for the 
purpose. 

This suggestion seems to have made a favor- 
able impression on the mind of Xerxes. He 
was disposed, in fact, to be pleased with any 
plan, provided it opened the way for his own 
escape from the dangers in which he imagined 
that he was entangled. He said that he would 

1 8— X' rxes 



248 XERXES. 

consult some of the other commanders upon the 
subject. He did so, and then, before commg 
to a final decision, he determined to confer 
with Artemisia. He remembered that she had 
counseled him not to attack the Greeks at Sala- 
mis, and, as the result had proved that counsel 
to be eminently wise, he felt the greater confi- 
dence in asking her judgment again. 

He accordingly sent for Artemisia, and, di- 
recting all the officers, as well as his own at« 
tendants, to retire, he held a private consulta- 
tion with her in respect to his plans. 

^' Mardonius proposes," said he, ^' that the 
expedition should on no account be abandoned 
in consequence of this disaster, for he says that 
the fleet is a very unimportant part of our 
force, and that the army still remains un- 
harmed. He proposes that, if I should decide 
myself to return to Persia, I should leave three 
hundred thousand men with him, and he un- 
dertakes, if I will do so, to complete, with 
them, the subjugation of Greece. Tell me 
what you think of this plan. You evinced so 
much sagacity in foreseeing the result of this 
engagement at Salamis, that I particularly 
wish to know your opinion." 

Artemisia, after pausing a little to reflect 
upon the subject, saying, as she hesitated, that 
it was rather difficult to decide, under the ex= 
traordinary circumstances in which they were 



THE RETURN TO PERSIA. 249 

placed, what it really was best to do, came at 
length to the conclusion that it would be wisest 
for the king to accede to Mardonius's proposal. 
^' Since he offers, of his own accord, to remain 
and undertake to complete the subjugation of 
Greece, you can, very safely to yourself, allow 
him to make the experiment. The great ob- 
ject which was announced as the one which 
you had chiefly in view in the invasion of 
Greece, was the burning of Athens. This is 
already accomplished. You have done, there- 
fore, what you undertook to do, and can, con- 
sequently, now return yourself, without dis- 
honor. If Mardonius succeeds in his attempt, 
the glory of it will redound to you. His vic- 
tories will be considered as only the successful 
completion of what you began. On the other 
hand, if he fails, the disgrace of failure will be 
his alone, and the injury will be confined to 
his destruction. In any event, your person, 
your interests, and your honor are safe, and if 
Mardonius is willing to take the responsibility 
and incur the danger involved in the plan that 
he proposes, I would give him the opportu- 
nity.'' 

Xerxes adopted the view of the subject whicli 
Artemisia thus presented with the utmost read- 
iness and pleasure. That advice is always very 
welcome which makes the course that we had 
previously decided upon as the most agreeable 



250 XERXES. 

Beem the most wise. Xerxes immediately de- 
termined on returning to Persia himself, and 
leaving Mardonius to complete the conquest. 
In carrying out this design, he concluded to 
march to the northward by land^ accompanied 
by a large portion of his army and by all his 
principal officers, until he reached the Helles- 
pont. Then he was to give np to Mardonius the 
command of such troops as should be selected 
to remain in Greece, and, crossing the Helles- 
pont, return himself to Persia with the re- 
mainder. 

If, as is generally the case, it is a panic that I 
causes a flight, a flight, in its turn, always in- 
creases a panic. It happened, in accordance 
with this general law, that, as soon as the 
thoughts of Xerxes were once turned toward an 
escape from Greece, his fears increased, and his 
mind became more and more the prey of a rest- 
less uneasiness and anxiety lest he should notj 
be able to effect his escape. He feared that the 
bridge of boats would have been broken down, 
and then how would he be able to cross the Hel- 
lespont ? To prevent the Greek fleet from pro- 
ceeding to the northward, and thus intercept- 
ing his passage by destroying the bridge, he de- 
termined to conceal, as long as possible, his own 
departure. Accordingly, while he was mak- 
ing the most efficient and rapid arrangements 
on the land for abandoning the whole region. 



THE RETURN TO PERSIA. 251 

he brought up his fleet by sea, and began to 
build, by means of the ships, a floating bridge 
from the main land to the island of Salamis, as 
if he were intent only on advancing. He con- 
tinued this work all day, postponing his in- 
tended retreat until the night should come, in 
order to conceal his movements. In the course 
of the day he placed all his family and family 
relatives on board of Artemisia's ship, under 
the charge of a tried and faithful domestic. 
Artemisia was to convey them, as rapidly as 
possible, to Ephesus, a strong city in Asia 
Minor, where Xerxes supposed that they would 
be safe. 

In the night the fleet, in obedience to the or- 
ders which Xerxes had given them, abandoned 
their bridge and all their other undertakings, 
and set sail. They were to make the best of 
their way to the Hellespont, and post them- 
selves there to defend the bridge of boats until 
Xerxes should arrive. On the following morn- 
ing, accordingly, when the sun rose, the Greeks 
found, to their utter astonishment, that their 
enemies were gone. 

A scene of the greatest animation and excite- 
ment on board the Greek fleet at once ensued. 
The commanders resolved on an immediate pur- 
suit. The seamen hoisted their sails, raised 
their anchors, and manned their oars, and the 
whole squadron was soon in rapid motion. The 



252 XERXES. 

fleet went as far as to the island of Andros, look- 
ing eagerly all around the horizon, in every di- 
rection, as they advanced, but no signs of the 
fugitives were to be seen. The ships then drew 
up to the shore, and the commanders were con= 
vened in an assembly, summoned by Eurybi- 
ades, on the land, for consultation. 

A debate ensued, in which the eternal en- 
mity and dissension between the Athenian and 
Peloponnesian Greeks broke out anew. There 
was, however, now some reason for the disagree- 
ment. The Athenian cause was already ruined. 
Their capital had been burned, their country 
ravaged, and their wives and children driven 
forth to exile and misery. Nothing remained 
now for them but hopes of revenge. They were 
eager, therefore, to press on, and overtake the 
Persian galleys in their flight, or, if this could 
not be done, to reach the Hellespont before 
Xerxes should arrive there, and intercept his 
passage by destroying the bridge. This was 
the policy which Themistocles advocated. 
Eurybiades, on the other hand, and the Pelo- 
ponnesian commanders, urged the expediency 
of not driving the Persians to desperation by har- 
assing them too closely on their retreat. They 
were formidable enemies after all, and, if they 
were now disposed to retire and leave the coun- 
try, it was the true policy of the Greeks to 
allow them to do so. To destroy the bridge 



THE RETURN TO PERSIA. 253 

of boats would only be to take effectual meas- 
ures for keeping the pest among them. The- 
mistocles was out-voted. It was determined 
best to allow the Persian forces to retire. 

Themistocles, when he found that his coun- 
sels were overruled, resorted to another of the 
audacious stratagems that marked his career, 
which was to send a second pretended message 
of friendship to the Persian king. He em- 
ployed the same Sicinnus on this occasion that 
he had sent before into the Persian fleet, on 
the eve of the battle of Salamis. A galley was 
given to Sicinnus, with a select crew of faith- 
ful men. They were all put under the most 
solemn oaths never to divulge to any person, 
under any circumstances, the nature and object 
of their commission. With this company, Si- 
cinnus left the fleet secretly in the night, and 
went to the coast of Attica. Landing here, he 
left the galley, with the crew in charge of it, 
upon the shore, and, with one or two select at- 
tendants, he made his way to the Persian camp, 
and desired an interview with the king. On 
being admitted to an audience, he said to 
Xerxes that he had been sent to him by Themis- 
tocles, whom he represented as altogether the 
most prominent man among the Greek com- 
manders, to say that the Greeks had resolved 
on pressing forward to the Hellespont, to in- 
tercept him on his return, but that he, The- 



254 XERXES. 

mistocles, had dissuaded them from it, under 
the influence of the same friendship xor Xerxes 
which had led him to send a friendly commu- 
nication to the Persians before the late battle ; 
that, in consequence of the arguments and per- 
suasions of Themistocles, the Greek squadrons 
would remain where they then were, on the 
southern coasts, leaving Xerxes to retire with- 
out molestation. 

All this was false, but Themistocles thought 
it would serve his purpose well to make the 
statement ; for, in case he should, at any future 
time, in following the ordinary fate of the 
bravest and most successful Greek generals, be 
obliged to fly in exile from his country to save 
his life, it might be important for him to have 
a good understanding beforehand with the 
King of Persia, though a good understanding, 
founded on pretensions so hypocritical and 
empty as these, would seem to be worthy of 
very little reliance. In fact, for a Greek gen- 
eral, discomfited in the councils of his own 
nation, to turn to the Persian king with such 
prompt and cool assurance, for the purpose of 
gaining his friendship by tendering falsehoods 
so bare and professions so hollow, was an instance 
of audacious treachery so original and lofty as 
to be almost sublime. ^ 

Xerxes pressed on with the utmost diligence \ 
toward the north. The country had been rav- 



THE KETURN TO PEKSIA. 255 

aged and exhausted by his march through it in 
coming down; and now, in returning, he found 
infinite difficulty in obtaining supplies of food 
and water for his army. Forty-five days were 
consumed in getting back to the Hellespont. 
During all this time the privations and suf- 
ferings of the troops increased every day. The 
soldiers were spent with fatigue, exhausted 
with hunger, and harassed with incessant ap- 
prehensions of attacks from their enemies. 
Thousands of the sick and wounded that at- 
tempted at first to follow the army, gave out 
by degrees as the columns moved on. Some 
were left at the encampments ; others lay down 
by the roadsides, in the midst of the day^s 
march, wherever their waning strength finally 
failed them ; and everywhere broken chariots, 
dead and dying beasts ofburden, and the bodies 
of soldiers, that lay neglected where they fell, 
encumbered and choked the way. In a word, 
all the roads leading toward the northern prov- 
inces exhibited in full perfection those awful 
scenes which usually mark the track of a great 
army retreating from an invasion. 

The men were at length reduced to extreme 
distress for food. They ate the roots and stems 
of the herbage, and finally stripped the very 
bark from the trees and devoured it, in the vain 
hope that it might afford some nutriment tore- 
enforce the vital principle, for a little time at 



250 XERXES. 

least, in the dreadful struggle which it was 
waging within them. There are certain forms 
of pestilential disease which, in cases like this, 
always set in to hasten the work which famine 
alone would be too slow in performing. Ac- 
cordingly, as was to have been expected, camp 
fevers, choleras, and other corrupt and infec- 
tious maladies, broke out with great violence 
as the army advanced along the northern shores 
of the ^gean Sea ; and as every victim to theso 
dreadful and hopeless disorders helped, by his 
own dissolution, to taint the air for all the rest, 
the wretched crowd was, in the end, reduced to 
the last extreme of misery and terror. 

At length Xerxes, with a miserable remnant 1 
of his troops, arrived at Abydos, on the shores 
of the Hellespont. He found the bridge broken 
down. The winds and storms had demolished 
what the Greeks had determined to spare. The 
immense structure, which it had cost so much 
toil and time to rear, had wholly disappeared, 
leaving no traces of its existence, except the 
wrecks which lay here and there half buried in 
the sand along the shore. There were some 
small boats at hand, and Xerxes, embarking in 
one of them, with a few attendants in the others, 
and leaving the exhausted and wretched rem- 
nant of his army behind, was rowed across the 
strait, and landed at last safely again on the 
Asiatic shores. 



THE RETURN TO PERSIA. 257 

The place of his landing was Sestos. From 
Sestos he went to Sardis, and from Sardis he 
proceeded, in a short time, to Susa. Mardo- 
nius was left in Greece. Mardoniiis was a gen- 
eral of great military experience and skill, and, 
when left to himself, he found no great difficul- 
ty in reorganizing the army, and in putting it 
again in an efficient condition. He was not 
able, however, to accomplish the undertaking 
which he had engaged to perform. After vari- 
ous adventures, prosperous and adverse, which 
it would be foreign to our purpose here to de- 
tail, he was at last defeated in a great battle, 
and killed on the field. The Persian army was 
now obliged to give up the contest, and was ex- 
pelled from Greece finally and forever. 

When Xerxes reached Susa, he felt over- 
joyed to find himself once more safe, as he 
thought, in his own palaces. He looked back 
upon the hardships, exposures, and perils 
through which he had passed, and, thankful 
for having so narrowly escaped from them, he 
determined to encounter no such hazards again. 
He had had enough of ambition and glory. 
He was now going to devote himself to ease 
and pleasure. Such a man would not naturally 
be expected to be very scrupulous in respect to 
the means of enjoyment, or to the character of 
the companions whom he would select to share 
his pleasures, and the life of the king soon 



258 XERXES. 

presented one continual scene of dissipation, 
revelry, and vice. He gave himself up to such 
prolonged carousals, that one night was some- 
times protracted through the following day 
into another. The administration of his gov- 
ernment was left wholly to his ministers, and 
every personal duty was neglected, that he 
might give himself to the most abandoned and 
profligate indulgence of his appetites and pas- 
sions, n 

He had three sons who might be considered 
as heirs to his throne — Darius, Hystaspes, and 
Artaxerxes. Hystaspes was absent in a neigh- 
boring province. The others were at home. 
He had also a very prominent officer in his 
court, whose name, Artabanus, was the same 
with that of the uncle who had so strongly at- 
tempted to dissuade him from undertaking the 
conquest of G-reece. Artabanus the uncle dis- 
appears finally from view at the time when 
Xerxes dismissed him to return to Susa at the 
first crossing of the Hellespont. This second 
Artabanus was the captain of the king's body- 
guard, and, consequently, the common execu- 
tioner of the despot's decrees. Being thus 
established in his palace, surrounded by his 
family, and protected by Artabanus and his 
guard, the monarch felt that all his toils and 
dangers were over, and that there was nothing 
now before him but a life of ease, of pleasure, 



THE RETURN TO PERSIA. 259 

and of safety. Instead of this, he was, in fact, 
in the most imminent danger. Artabanns was 
already plotting his destruction. 

One day in the midst of one of his carousals, ^^ 
he became angry with his oldest son Darius for 
some cause, and gave Artabanus an order to 
kill him. Artabanus neglected to obey this 
order. The king had been excited with wine 
when he gave it, and Artabanus supposed that 
all recollection of the command would pass 
away from his mind with the excitement that 
occasioned it. The king did not, however, so 
readily forget. The next day he demanded 
why his order had not been obeyed. Arta- 
banus now began to fear for his own safety, 
and he determined to proceed at once to the 
execution of a plan which he had long been 
revolving, of destroying the whole of Xerxes^'s 
family, and placing himself on the throne in 
their stead. He contrived to bring the king^s 
chamberlain into his schemes, and, with the 
connivance and aid of this officer, he went at 
night into the king's bed-chamber, and mur- 
dered the monarch in his sleep. 

Leaving the bloody weapon with which the 
deed had been perpetrated by the side of the 
victim, Artabanus went immediately into the 
bed-chamber of Artaxerxes, the youngest son, 
and, awaking him s^nddenly, he told him, with 
tones of voice and looks expressive of great 



260 



XEEXES. 



excitement and alarm^ tliat his father had been 
killed^ and that it was his brother Darius that 
had killed him. '^ His motive is/' continued 
Artabanus, '^ to obtain the throne, and to make 
the more sure of an undisturbed possession of 
it, he is intending to murder you next. Eise, 
therefore, and defend your life." 

Artaxerxes was aroused to a sudden and un- 
controllable paro:^ysm of anger at this intelli- 
gence. He seized his weapon, and rushed into 
the apartment of his innocent brother, and slew 
him on the spot. Other summary assassina- 
tions of a similar kind followed in this compli- 
cated tragedy. Among the victims, Artabanus 
and all his adherents were slain, and at length 
Artaxerxes took quiet possession of the throne, 
and reigned in his father's stead. 




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6 ALTEMUS* YOUNG PEOPLE'S LIBRARY. 

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Great Britain, and the War with Mexico. 

BATTLES OF THE WAR FOR THE UNION. By 
Prescott Holmes. With 80 illustrations. 

A correct and impartial account of the greatest civil war in the 
annals of history. Both of these histories of American wars are 
a necessary part of the education of all intelligent American boys 
and girls. 

YOUNG PEOPLE'S HISTORY OF THE WAR WITH 

SPAIN. By Prescott Holmes. With 89 illustrations. 

This history of our war with Spain, in 1898, presents in a plain, 
easy style the splendid achievements of our army and navy, and 
the prominent figures that came into the public view during that 
period. Its glowing descriptions, wealth of anecdote, accuracy of 
statement and profusion of illustration make it a most desirable 
gift-book for young readers. 

HEROES OF THE UNITED STATES NAVY. By 
Hartwell James. With 65 illustrations. 

The story of our navy is one of the most brilliant pages in the 
world's history. The sketches and exploits contained in this vol- 
ume cover our entire naval history from the days of the hone>t, 
rough sailors of Revolutionary times, with their cutlasses and 
boarding pikes, to the brief war of 1898, when our superbly ap- 
pointed warships destroyed Spain' s proud cruisers by the merci- 
less accuracy of their fire. 

MILITARY HEROES OF THE UNITED STATES. 
By Hartwell James. With 97 illustrations. 

In this volume the brave lives and heroic deeds c f our military 
heroes, from Paul Revere to Lawton, are told in the most captiva- 
ting manner. The material for the work has been gathered from 
the North and the Sou h alike. The volume presents all the im- 
portant facts in a manner enabling the young people of our united 
and prosperous land to easily become familiar with the command- 
ing figures that have arisen in our military history. 

UNCLE TOM'S CABIN; or Life Among the Lowly. By 
Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe. With 90 illustrations. 



ALTEMUS* YOUNG PEOPLE'S LIBRARY. 



The unfailing interest in the famous old story suggested the need 
of an edition specially prepared for young readers, and elaborately 
illustrated. This edition completely fills that want. 

SEA KINGS AND NAVAL HEROES. By Hartwell 
James. With 50 illustrations. 

The most famous sea battles of the world, with sketches of the 
lives, enterprises and achievements of men who have become fam- 
ous in naval history. They are stories of brave lives in times of 
trial and danger, charmingly told for young people. 

POOR BOYS' CHANCES. By John Habberton. With 
50 illustrations. 

There is a fascination about the writings of the author of 
" Helen's Babies," from which none can escape. In this charm- 
ing \oIume, Mr. Habberton tells the boys of America how they 
can attain the highest positions in the land, without the struggles 
and privations endured by poor boys who rose to eminence and 
fame in former times. 

ROMULUS, the Founder of Rome. By Jacob Abbott. 
With 49 illustrations. 

In a plain and connected narrative, the author tells the stories 
of the founder of Rome and his great ancestor, ^neas. These 
are of necessity sumewhat legendary in character, but are pre- 
sented precisely as they have come down to us from ancient times. 
They are prefaced by an account of the life and inventions of Cad- 
mus, the " Father of the Alphabet," as he is often called. 

CYRUS THE GREAT, the Founder of the Persian Empire. 

By Jacob Abbott. With 40 illustrations. 

For nineteen hundred years, the story of the founder of the an- 
cient Persian empire has been read by every generation of man- 
kind. The story of the life and actions of Cyrus, as told by the 
author, presents vivid pictures of the magnificence of a monarchy 
that rose about five hundred years before the Christian era, and 
rolled on in undisturbed magnitude and glory for many centuries. 

ADVENTURES IN TOYLAND. By Edith King Hull. 

With 70 illustrations by Alice B. Woodward. 

The sayings and doin^^softhe dwellers in toyland, related by 
one of them to a dear little girl. It is a delightful book for chil- 
dren, and admirably illustrated. 



ALTEMUS* YOUNG PEOPLE'S LIBRARY. 



DARIUS THE GREAT, King of the Medes and Persians. 
By Jacob Abbott. With 34 illustrations. 

No great exploits marked the career of this monarch, who was 
at one time the absolute sovereign of nearly one-half of the world. 
He reached his high position by a stratagem, and left behind him 
no strong impressions of personal character, yet, the history of his 
life and reign should be read along with those of Cyrus, Caesar, 
Hannibal and Alexander. 

XERXES THE GREAT, King of Persia. By Jacob Ab- 
bott. With 39 illustrations. 

For ages the name of Xerxes has been associated in the minds 
of men with the idea of the highest attainable human magnificence 
and grandeur. He was the sovereign of the ancient Persian em- 
pire at the height of its prosperity and power. The invasion of 
Greece by the Persian hordes, the battle of Thermopylae, the burn- 
ing of Athens, and the defeat of the Persian galleys at Salamis are 
chapters of thrilling interest. 

THE ADVENTURES OF A BROWNIE. By Miss 
Mulock, author of John Halifax, Gentleman, etc. With 
18 illustrations. 

One of the best of Miss Murlock's charming stories for children. 
All the situations are amusing and are sure to please youthful 
readers. 

ALEXANDER THE GREAT, King of Macedon. By 

Jacob Abbott. With 51 illustrations. 

Born heir to the throne of Macedon, a country on the confines 
of Europe and Asia, Alexander crowded into a brief career of 
twelve years a brilliant series of exploits. The readers of to-day 
will find pleasure and profit in the history of Alexander the Great, 
a potentate before whom ambassadors and princes from nearly all 
the nations of the earth bowed in humility. 

PYRRHUS, King of Epirus. By Jacob Abbott. With 45 

illustrations. 

The story of Pyrrhus is one of the ancient narratives which has 
been told and retold for many centuries in the literature, eloquence 
and poetry of all civilized nations. While possessed of extraordi- 
nary ability as a military leader, Pyrrhus actually accomplished 
nothing, but did mischief on a gigantic scale. He was naturally 



ALTEMUS* YOUNG PEOPLE'S LIBRARY. 



of a noble and generous spirit, but only succeded in perpetrating 
crimes against the peace and welfare of mankind. 

HANNIBAL, the Carthaginian. By Jacob Abbott. With 
37 illustrations. 

Hannibal's distinction as a warrior was gained during the des- 
perate contests between Rome and Carthage, known as the Punic 
wars. Entering the scene when his country was engaged in peace- 
ful traffic with the various countries of the known world, he turned 
its energies into military aggression, conquest and war, becoming 
himself one of the greatest military heroes the world has ever 
known. 

MIXED PICKLES. By Mrs. E. M. Field. With 31 illus- 
trations by T. Pym. 

A remarkably entertaining story for young people. The reader 
is introduced to a charming little girl whose mishaps while trying 
to do good are very appropriately termed " Mixed Pickles." 

JULIUS C^SAR, the Roman Conqueror. By Jacob Ab- 
bott. With 44 illustrations. 

The life and actions of Julius Casar embrace a period in Roman 
history beginning with the civil wars of Marius and Sylla and end- 
ing with the tragic death of Caesar Imperator. The work is an 
accurate historical account of the life and times of one of the great 
military figures in history, ia fact, it is history itself, and as such is 
especially commended to the readers of the present generation. 

ALFRED THE GREAT, of England. By Jacob Abbott. 
With 40 illustrations. 

In a certain sense, Alfred appears in history as the founder of 
the British monarchy : his predecessors having governed more like 
savage chieftains than English kings. The work has a special 
value for young readers, for the character of Alfred was that of an 
honest, conscientious and far-seeing statesman. The romantic 
story of Godwin furnishes the concluding chapter of the volume. 

WILLIAM THE CONQUEROR, of England. By Jacob 
Abbott. With 43 illustrations. 

The life and times of William of Normandy have always been a 
fruitful theme for the historian. War and pillage and conquest 
were at least a part of the everyday business of men in both Eng- 



lO ALTEMUS* YOUNG PEOPLE'S LIBRARY. 

land and France : and the story of William as told by the author 
of this volume makes some of the most fascinating page.^ in his- 
tory. It is especially delightful to young readtr-;. 

FIERNANDO CORTEZ, the Conqueror of Mexico. By. 
Jacob Abbott. With 30 illustrations. 

In this volume the author gives vivid pictures of the wild and 
adventurous career of Cortez and his companions in the conque>t 
of Mexico. Many good motives were united with those of ques- 
tionable character, in the prosecution of his enterprise, but in 
those days it v.'as a matter of national ambition to enlarge the 
boundaries of nations and to extend their commerce at any cost. 
The career of Cortez is one of absorbing interest. 

THE LITTLE LAME PRINCE. By Miss Mulock. With 
24 illustrations. 

The author styles it "A Parable for Old and Young." It is in her 
happiest vein and delightfully interesting, especially to youthful 
readers. 

MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. By Jacob Abbott. With 
45 illustrations. 

The story of Mary Stuart holds a prominent place in the present 
series of historical narrations. It has had many tellings, for the 
melancholy story of the unfortunate queen has always held a high 
place in the estimation of successive generations of readers. Her 
story is full of romance and pathos, and the reader is carried along 
by conflicting emotions of wonder and sympathy. 

QUEEN ELIZABETH, of England. By Jacob Abbott. 
With 49 illustrations. 

In strong contrast to the story of Mary, Queen of Scots, is that 
of Elizabeth, Queen of England. They were cousins, yet im- 
placable foes. Elizabeth's reign was in many ways a glorious one, 
and her successes gained her the applause of the world. The 
stirring tales of Drake, Hawkins and other famous mariners of 
her lime have been incorporated into the story of Elizabeth's life 
and reign. 

KING CHARLES THE FIRST, of England. By Jacob 
Abbott. With 41 illustrations. 

The well-known figures in the stormy reign of Charles T. are 
brought forward in this narrative of his life and times. It is his- 
tory told in the most fascinating manner, and embraces the early 



ALTEMUS* YOUNG PEOPLE'S LIBRARY. II 

life of Charles ; the court of James I.; struggles between Charles 
and the Parliament ; the Civil war ; the trial and execution of the 
king. The narrative is impartial and holds the attention of the 
reader. 

KING CHARLES THE SECOND, of England. By Jacob 
Abbott. With ;^S illustrations. 

Beginning with his infancy, the life of the *' Merry Monarch " 
is related in the author's inimitable style. His reign was signal- 
ized by many disastrous events, besides those that related to his 
personal troubles and embarrassments. There were unfortunate 
wars ; naval defeats ; dangerous and disgraceful plots and con- 
spiracies. Trobule sat very lightly on the shoulders of Charles II., 
however, and the cares of state were easily forgotten in the society 
of his court and dogs. 

THE SLEEPY KING. By Aubrey Hopwood and Seymour 

Hicks. With 77 illustrations by Maud Trelawney. 

A charmingly-told Fairy Tale, full of delight and entertain- 
ment. The illustrations are original and striking, adding greatly 
to the interest of the text. 

MARIA ANTOINETTE, Queen of France. By John S. C. 

Abbott. With 42 illustrations. 

The tragedy of Maria Antoinette is one of the most mournful in 
the history of the world. " Her beauty dazzled the whole king- 
dom," says Lamartine. Her lofty and unbending spirit under 
unspeakable indignities and atrocities, enlists and holds the sympa- 
thies of the readers of to-day, as it has done in the past. 

MADAME ROLAND, A Heroine of the French Revolution. 

By Jacob Abbott. With 42 illustrations. 

The French Revolution developed few, if any characters more 
worthy of notice than that of Madame Roland. The absence of 
playmates, in her youth, inspired her with an insatiate thirst for 
knowledge, and books became her constant companions in every 
unoccupied hour. She fell a martyr to the tyrants of the French 
Revolution, but left behind her a career full of instruction that 
never fails to impress itself upon the reader. 

JOSEPHINE, Empress of France. By Jacob Abbott. With 
40 illustrations. 



12 ALTEMUS* YOUNG PEOPLE'S LIBRARY. 

Maria Antoinette beheld the dawn of the French Revolution ; 
Madame Roland perished under the lurid glare of its high noon ; 
Josephine saw it fade into darkness. She has been called the 
" Star of Napoleon ; " and it is certain that she added luster to 
his brilliance, and that her persuasive influence was often exerted 
to win a friend or disarm an adversary. The lives of the Empress 
Josephine, of Maria Antoinette, and of Madame Roland are 
especially commended to young lady readers. 

TALES FROM SHAKESPEARE. By Charles and Mary 
Lamb. With 80 illustrations. 

The text is somewhat abridged and edited for young people, but 
a clear and definite outline of each play is presented. Such episodes 
or incidental sketches of character as are not absolutely necessary 
to the development of the tales are omitted, while the many moral 
lessons that lie in Shakespeare's plays and make them valuable in 
the training of the young are retained. The b 10k is winnmg, help- 
ful and an effectual guide to the "inner shrine" of the great 
dramatist. 

MAKERS OF AMERICA. By Hartwell James. With 75 
illustrations. 

This volume contains attractive and suggestive sketches of the 
lives and deeds of men who illustrated some special phase in the 
political, religious or social life of our country, from its settlement 
to the close of the eighteenth century. It affords an opportunity 
for young readers to become easily familiar with these characters 
and their historical relations to the building of our Republic. An 
account of the discovery of America prefaces the work. 

A WONDER BOOK FOR BOYS AND GIRLS. By 
Nathaniel Hawthorne. With 50 illustrations. 

IxL tjjj^ volume the genius of Hawthorne has shaped anew 
wonder tales that have been hallowed by an antiquity of two or 
three thousand years. Seeming " never to have been made " they 
are legitimate subjects for every age to clothe with its own fancy 
as to manners and sentiment, and its own views of morality. The 
volume has a charm fo old and young alike, for the author has 
not thought it necessary to "write downward" in order to meet 
the comprehensjion of children. 



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